South Atlantic: Britain May Provoke New Conflict With Argentina

[Judi Lynn]

South Atlantic: Britain May Provoke New Conflict With Argentina
Submitted by Chip on Wed, 2010-02-24 20:36. EuropeSouth America
South Atlantic: Britain May Provoke New Conflict With Argentina
Rick Rozoff | Stop NATO | Blog site

On February 22 two major developments occurred in the Americas south of the Rio Grande. The two-day Rio Group summit opened in Mexico and Great Britain started drilling for oil 60 miles north of the Falklands Islands, known as Las Malvinas to Argentina.

The meeting in Mexico was identified as a Unity Summit because for the first time the 24 members of the Rio Group (minus Honduras, not invited because of the illegitimacy of its post-coup regime) - Argentina, Belize, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Cuba, the Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Guyana, Haiti, Jamaica, Mexico, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Suriname, Uruguay and Venezuela - were joined by the fifteen members of the Caribbean Community (CARICOM): Antigua and Barbuda, the Bahamas, Barbados, Belize, Dominica, Grenada, Guyana, Haiti, Jamaica, Montserrat, Saint Lucia, St. Kitts and Nevis, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, Suriname, Trinidad and Tobago. (Haiti, Jamaica and Suriname are members of both organizations.)

Ahead of the summit the Financial Times wrote, "The Mexican-led initiative, a clear sign of Latin America’s growing confidence as a region, will exclude both the US and Canada. Some observers believe it could even eventually rival the 35-member Organisation of American States (OAS), which includes the US and Canada and has been the principal forum for hemispheric issues during the past half century." <1>

In fact on the first day of the summit Bolivian President Evo Morales called for a "a new US-free OAS," <2> stressing Washington's centuries-long history of perpetrating military coups, blackmail, looting of natural resources and, over the past generation, the scourge of neo-liberalism in the Americas.

In 1986 the Rio Group grew out of the four-member Contradora Group consisting of Colombia, Mexico, Panama and Venezuela which was formed in response to Washington's Contra and death squad campaigns in Nicaragua, El Salvador and Guatemala in the 1980s. Part of the legacy Bolivia's Morales was referring to.

More:
http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/node/50345

[dipsydoodle]

1. I think some sort of amicable agreement will be reached - eventually

The oil and gas whatever from the Falklands will need a terminal. Cheapest and most practical location for that would be in Argentina.

[protocol rv]

2. Why?

If they are drilling north of the Falklands, the terminal would be located on the downwind side, on one of the islands, not in Argentina. But don't worry, they won't find enough oil to produce, it's mostly much noise about nothing.

[dipsydoodle]

4. The subject has already been discussed

maybe you don't get much news where you are.

[protocol rv]

3. Interesting

How can an organization which excludes the US and Canada be a rival to one WITH the US and Canada? Their combined population is 330 million, their combined economies are larger than all of the other nations' combined. Assuming Cuba stays out, and Venezuela leaves the OAS due to its ongoing difficulties with the human rights issues, OAS without Venezuela and Cuba would still be much more significant than a new organization without the US and Canada.