OEA - Documento CP ACTA. 2444 25 de 2025

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OEA/Ser.G

CP/ACTA 2444/23

25 agosto 2023

ACTA

DE LA SESIÓN PROTOCOLAR

CELEBRADA

EL 25 DE AGOSTO DE 2023

Para recibir al Excelentísimo doctor, el Honorable Ralph E. Gonsalves, Primer Ministro de San Vicente y las Granadinas

ÍNDICE

Página

Nómina de los miembros que asistieron a la sesión 1

Palabras de la Presidenta del Consejo Permanente de la Organización de los Estados

Americanos, Embajadora Audrey P. Marks, Representante Permanente de Jamaica 3

Palabras del Secretario General de la Organización de los Estados Americanos,

señor Luis Almagro Lemes 4

Palabras del Primer Ministro de San Vicente y las Granadinas, Excelentísimo doctor

el Honorable Ralph E. Gonsalves 6

CONSEJO PERMANENTE DE LA ORGANIZACIÓN DE LOS ESTADOS AMERICANOS

ACTA DE LA SESIÓN PROTOCOLAR

CELEBRADA EL 25 DE AGOSTO DE 2023

En la ciudad de Washington, D. C., a las once y treinta y siete del viernes 25 de agosto de 2023, celebró sesión protocolar el Consejo Permanente de la Organización de los Estados Americanos para recibir al Excelentísimo doctor, el Honorable Ralph E. Gonsalves, Primer Ministro de San Vicente y las Granadinas. Presidió la sesión la Embajadora Audrey P. Marks, Representante Permanente de Jamaica y Presidenta del Consejo Permanente. Asistieron los siguientes miembros:

Embajador Anthony Phillips-Spencer, Representante Permanente de Trinidad y Tobago

Embajadora Lou-Anne Gaylene Gilchrist, Representante Permanente de San Vicente y las Granadinas

Embajadora Rita Claverie de Sciolli, Representante Permanente de Guatemala

Embajador Noel Anderson Lynch, Representante Permanente de Barbados

Embajadora Luz Elena Baños Rivas, Representante Permanente de México

Embajadora Rita Claverie de Sciolli, Representante Permanente de Guatemala

Embajador Noel Anderson Lynch, Representante Permanente de Barbados

Embajadora Luz Elena Baños Rivas, Representante Permanente de México

Embajador Hugh Adsett, Representante Permanente del Canadá

Embajadora María del Carmen Roquebert León, Representante Permanente de Panamá

Embajador Josué Antinoe Fiallo Billini, Representante Permanente de la República Dominicana

Embajador Washington Abdala, Representante Permanente del Uruguay

Embajadora Alejandra Solano Cabalceta, Representante Permanente de Costa Rica

Embajador Samuel Hinds, Representante Permanente de Guyana

Embajador Leon Charles, Representante Permanente de Haití

Embajador Chet Donovan Neymour, Representante Permanente del Commonwealth de las Bahamas

Embajadora Elizabeth Darius-Clarke, Representante Permanente de Santa Lucía

Embajador Jan Marten Willem Schalkwijk, Representante Permanente de Suriname

Embajador Mauricio Montalvo Samaniego, Representante Permanente del Ecuador

Embajador Luis Ernesto Vargas, Representante Permanente de Colombia

Embajador Francisco O. Mora, Representante Permanente de los Estados Unidos

Embajador Benoni Belli, Representante Permanente del Brasil

Consejera Sonia Rosita Boddie-Thompson, Representante Interina de Saint Kitts y Nevis

Embajadora Wendy Jeannette Acevedo Castillo, Representante Interina de El Salvador

Ministra Consejera Joy-Dee Davis-Lake, Representante Alterna de Antigua y Barbuda

Ministra Consejera Saira Esmeralda Ponce Rosales, Representante Alterna de Honduras

Tercer Secretario Roberto Nicolás Villegas Romani, Representante Alterno de Chile

Ministra Maria Cecilia Villagra, Representante Alterna de la Argentina

Primer Secretario Lucio Edgar Mamani Quispe, Representante Alterno de Bolivia

Ministra Consejera Carla María Cueva Navarro, Representante Alterna del Perú

Ministra Maria Cecilia Villagra, Representante Alterna de la Argentina

Primer Secretario Lucio Edgar Mamani Quispe, Representante Alterno de Bolivia

Ministra Consejera Carla María Cueva Navarro, Representante Alterna del Perú

Ministra Consejera Cinnamon Elizabeth Bottaro, Representante Alterna de Belize

Ministra Cecilia Pérez Rivas, Representante Alterna del Paraguay

Ministra Delita Elizabeth McCallum, Representante Alterna de Jamaica

También estuvieron presentes el Secretario General de la Organización, señor Luis Almagro Lemes, y el Secretario General Adjunto, Embajador Nestor Mendez, Secretario del Consejo Permanente.

PALABRAS DE LA PRESIDENTA DEL CONSEJO PERMANENTE DE LA ORGANIZACIÓN DE LOS ESTADOS AMERICANOS, EMBAJADORA AUDREY P. MARKS,

REPRESENTANTE PERMANENTE DE JAMAICA

La PRESIDENTA: Good morning, I am pleased to declare open this protocolary meeting of the Permanent Council, which has been convened to receive the Prime Minister of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, His Excellency, Dr. the Honorable Ralph Gonsalves. The order of business is approved.

I invite all meeting participants to rise as we welcome the Prime Minister of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, His Excellency, Dr. the Honorable Ralph E. Gonsalves.

His Excellency, Dr. the Honorable Ralph E. Gonsalves, Prime Minister of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines and distinguished members of his delegation; Ambassador Lou-Anne Gilchrist, Permanent Representative of Saint Vincent and Grenadines to the Organization of American States (OAS); distinguished permanent, interim and alternate representatives of the member states; Mr. Luis Almagro, Secretary General; Ambassador Nestor Mendez, Assistant Secretary General; distinguished permanent observers, ladies and gentlemen:

On behalf of the Permanent Council of the Organization of American States it is an honor for me to greet the Prime Minister of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, His Excellency Dr. the Honorable Ralph Gonsalves, and to offer him a most cordial welcome to this House of the Americas.

The illustrious Prime Minister of Saint Vincent and Grenadines is a prominent Caribbean politician who has been a key figure in the political landscape of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines for several decades serving as a Prime Minister since 2001. Prime Minister Gonsalves has been instrumental in shaping the nation's policies.

He is also the longest serving elected Head of Government in this Hemisphere. Born in Colonarie, Saint Vincent, he was raised in a family that was actively involved in politics and social activism. His father was a trade union leader, while his mother was known for her community service. This environment laid the foundation for his commitment to public service.

Prime Minister Gonsalves pursued his higher education at the University of the West Indies in Jamaica, where he obtained a bachelor's and master's degree in economics. He then continued his studies at the University of Manchester in England, earning a PhD in government. His doctoral studies at the University of Manchester also included one year at Makerere University in Uganda. Later, he was called to the bar at Gray's Inn in London and was a practicing lawyer in Saint Vincent and the Grenadines for several decades before his election as Prime Minister.

Prime Minister Gonsalves's political journey began in the 1960s when he became actively involved in student activism at the University of the West Indies. In 1982 he formed the Movement for National Unity Party, which later gave way to the formation of the Unity Labour Party. He was elected as a member of parliament in 1994 and subsequently became the leader of the opposition.

In March 2001 he was first elected as Prime Minister of Saint Vincent and Grenadines and focused his leadership on economic growth, poverty reduction, greater access to education, and social equality. Under Prime Minister Gonsalves’s leadership, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines has achieved notable advancement in various sectors. His government introduced initiatives to enhance education, healthcare, and infrastructure development. The Education Revolution program sought to improve access to quality education with investments in schools, scholarships, and educational technology. Additionally, healthcare reforms were done aimed to provide the population with better medical facilities and services.

Prime Minister Gonsalves's Administration prioritized environmental sustainability, acknowledging the country's vulnerability to climate change. He advocates for global action on climate issues and spearheaded efforts to protect marine and coastal ecosystems in Saint Vincent and the Grenadines.

Prime Minister Gonsalves's diplomatic efforts extend beyond his nation's borders. He advocates for greater unity among Caribbean nations to address common challenges and seize collective opportunities. He has been a champion of regional integration through organizations like the Organisation of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS) and the Caribbean community (CARICOM). As a longtime champion for reparations for native genocide and slavery, his leadership was instrumental in the formation of the CARICOM Reparations Committee.

In 2019, at his country's behest, Prime Minister Gonsalves led a successful bid for a non-permanent seat on the United Nations (UN) Security Council for the period January 2020 to December 2021, making Saint Vincent and the Grenadines election a historic one as the smallest nation to have ever been elected to and serve on the UN Security Council. In January of this year, Prime Minister Gonsalves assumed the Presidency of the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC), over which he will preside for the period 2023 to 2024.

Excellency, your leadership as the Prime Minister of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines has been marked by a dedication to the betterment of your country, the Caribbean region as a whole, and to the international community. Your journey from an activist to a statesman is a testament to your unwavering commitment to public service. Through your policies, achievements, and enduring legacy, you have left an indelible mark on the history and future of your nation.

As a prominent representative of Jamaica, a fellow Caribbean CARICOM sister nation, it is an honor for me to welcome you once again to this esteemed hall, the Hall of the Americas. Honorable Prime Minister, OAS member states thank you for your visit today.

Palabras del Secretario General de la Organización de los

Estados Americanos, señor Luis Almagro Lemes

La PRESIDENTA: At this time, I am pleased to offer the floor to Mr. Luis Almagro, Secretary General of the Organization of American States. Mr. Secretary General the floor is yours.

El SECRETARIO GENERAL: Thank you Madam Chair. Prime Minister Ralph Gonsalves, greetings also to my distinguished colleagues and friends.

Prime Minister, it is a great privilege and honor to welcome you once again to this House of Americas.

You are a very referential leader in this Hemisphere, Prime Minister. Your publications have been an educational tool for Latin Americans and Caribbeans in ways to confront and overcome the difficult issues of making politics, economics and society work, in an integrated society, and they also underline the importance of a strong labor movement and trade unions.

Also, your passionate advocacy for a more perfect union in the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) has been admirable and inspiring, particularly as it points the way for CARICOM to secure a seat at the table of international decision-making.

With this in mind, Prime Minister, congratulations on assuming the Presidency of the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC), and for being the first CARICOM leader to be elected unanimously to this position. The countries of the CELAC are certainly profiting from being guided by your sage political and hemispheric experience over the next several months.

Also, a happy belated birthday on another milestone year, which is celebrated on August 8. Prime Minister, I concur with your sentiments on making purposeful efforts toward regional integration and promoting dialogue to sustain democratic institutions and healthy democracies in the region.

Sir, you have taken a principled stand on ideological differences. You have advocated for the right for different ideological positions to co-exist not in conflict and confrontation, but in tolerance and cooperation, seeking the best of all ideologies to fashion positions best suited to the region. In this regard, you have not only been a voice of reason; you have also been a teacher.

I want to highlight your elaboration study about ideology. Definitely, the ideological elaboration is essential just as much as the ideological study is essential. We have to responsibly apply ideas to the reality of our societies without losing rationality or pragmatism, because the reason has to meet the logic of our needs in order to create a utopia that guides us through our practical dimension of the things we need to solve.

I also acknowledge your efforts in support for a dialogue with certain countries where there have been evidentiary issues in the Hemisphere. The Organization of American States (OAS) supports all initiatives that are aimed at maintaining good neighborliness and promoting peace for the benefit of all people of the Americas.

Prime Minister, while political critics may criticize your unrelenting support to overcome centuries of gender inequality, I must applaud your efforts to achieve the full and equal representation and participation of women and girls in the decision-making process in your country. As an example, your Minister of Foreign Affairs the Honorable Keisal Peters, as well as our dear friend and most efficient Ambassador Lou-Anne Gaylene Gilchrist, as well as her predecessor La Celia Prince. Prime Minister, all these Caribbean women do your country a great honor in the Councils of the OAS.

Our Organization is continuously working to address regional concerns, specifically those held within the Caribbean Community, such as the situation in Haiti, the climate crisis, natural disaster preparedness, efforts towards reparatory justice, appeals to international financial institutions for access to concessional financing, combating drug trafficking and other security concerns that create challenges for our dear sisters and brothers in the Caribbean Community.

I have highlighted, time and again, the importance of having more fair financial institutions in the world, not pitting Caribbean countries against Latin American countries as enemies when they must support development. I have highlighted, time and again, the importance of the Caribbean constituency in this Organization and the whole multilateral system in the world. CARICOM provides balance and reasoning on matters that affect all the people of the Americas. I endorse your statements in Haiti, in that we must be balanced in any negotiations with the actors in Haiti.

Dr. Gonsalves, you are principled in your determination and advocacy pertaining to several issues, including reparatory justice, which you raised at the European Union (EU)-CELAC Summit held last month, acknowledging that it is time to have a mature conversation on the subject. As President pro-tempore of CELAC you were able to appeal to the countries to include the item on the joint declaration with the European Union stating that the countries “acknowledge and profoundly regret the untold suffering inflicted on millions of men, women, and children as a result of the Transatlantic Slave Trade.” I congratulate you on that accomplishment.

Despite the claims issued by detractors, who characterize reparatory justice as “a distraction,” we at the OAS will support efforts towards reparative justice, which include appeals for debt relief and debt support to former colonies in the Americas, and for the development of academic, health, and cultural initiatives for our peoples in the Americas from former colonial powers.

As you asserted to the OAS Permanent Council on your last visit to the Organization on November 6, 2015, “the quest for reparation is not conceived as a strategic confrontation against these European nations, although it is for us in the Caribbean a defining issue in the twenty-first century for justice, reconciliation, and righting of historical wrongs.”

Indeed, Prime Minister, this is an important pathway to dismantle the remnants of our dark history, and instead breed understanding and reconciliation.

Prime Minister, I thank you and your government for your continued support and contributions to the OAS, including your most recent donation of a painting by Calvert Jones to the Art Museum of the Americas which expands our Caribbean collection.

On this and many more matters, may you continue to make a difference by courageously walking on the road less traveled.

Thank you.

La PRESIDENTA: Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Secretary General.

Palabras del Primer Ministro de San Vicente y las Granadinas, Excelentísimo doctor, el Honorable Ralph E. Gonsalves

La PRESIDENTA: I now have the distinct honor to offer the floor to the Prime Minister of Saint Vincent and Grenadines His Excellency Dr. the Honorable Ralph Gonsalves. Mr. Prime Minister, you have the floor.

El PRIMER MINISTRO DE SAN VICENTE Y LAS GRANADINAS: Thank you Chair.

La PRESIDENTA: I now have the distinct honor to offer the floor to the Prime Minister of Saint Vincent and Grenadines His Excellency Dr. the Honorable Ralph Gonsalves. Mr. Prime Minister, you have the floor.

El PRIMER MINISTRO DE SAN VICENTE Y LAS GRANADINAS: Thank you Chair.

First I would like to acknowledge the Chair of the Permanent Council, her Excellency Audrey Marks, Permanent Representative of Jamaica; His Excellency, the Secretary General of the Organization of American States (OAS), Luis Almagro; my friend the Assistant Secretary General, His Excellency Nestor Mendez; and permanent representatives, alternate representatives, permanent observers and the staff of the Secretariat:

I, first of all, would like to thank of the leadership of the OAS for having a gathering of this kind today and afford me the privilege of having a conversation with you from the podium.

I am very, very pleased that the Chair of today's proceedings is a graduate of the premier university in the Caribbean, the University of the West Indies, a university which I also attended and which I taught for some years both in Jamaica, and in Barbados. She is as a member of Mary Seacole Hall. Mary Seacole is a very famous Jamaican woman who distinguished herself as a nurse with traditional medicine in the Crimea. Yes, the Crimea. This is a woman who taught herself nursing and who had traversed Latin America and lived for quite some time in Panama and was a businesswoman and nurse, and she is seen as one of the leading Black personalities who ever lived in the United Kingdom. She is revered among Black people who are nurses, and, indeed, is seen as the equal of Florence Nightingale, who was in the Crimea at the time when Mary Seacole was there. So, I'm very happy for my dear sister Audrey to be welcoming me here to this august body.

I also want to say to her, as I have said many times before, that Jamaica taught me a great deal. I was a student there for five years at the University of the West Indies, when I was a young man, and it brought me into manhood. I also lectured there for a couple of years after I finished my doctoral studies in the United Kingdom. So, I owe a lot to Jamaica, and I want to thank you and the people of Jamaica very much.

To make one correction in the notations concerning my family background. Though my father left school at eleven years old to work on a plantation as an agricultural laborer and became a small businessman—he is a peasant farmer—he was not involved in trade unionism, though he had always been sympathetic to the trade union movement and always imbued in me a sense of justice, and fairness, and equity, which in part fueled my own political consciousness. And I remember him very much, and so too, my mother who fathered me.

Today, I want to speak on a broad subject with you. A time of respair-R-E-S-P-A-I-R. Beyond Covid, economic dislocation, climate emergency, and global turmoil— fresh hope for Latin America and the Caribbean.

In March 2020, the World Health Organization (WHO) declared the raging COVID-19 pandemic a global health emergency of disastrous proportions. For some eighteen months, or more, the global economy was plunged into a veritable tailspin as a consequence of this continuing public health disaster. Practically every economy in the world has suffered moderate to severe declines. Particularly hard-hit were underdeveloped and developing economies, inclusive of most in Latin America and the Caribbean, home to 650 million people.

Simultaneously, the ravages of man-made climate change, including hurricanes, storms, landslides, drought, land degradation, desertification, and biodiversity calamities, were evident in every corner of the globe, including “our America”— to use José Marti’s telling description— and also in our Hemisphere. My own country, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, additionally suffered twenty-one volcanic eruptions in April 2021 giving rise to the evacuation and temporary resettlement of 20 percent of the population.

Meanwhile, the contradictions in the global political economy, within and between nations, exacerbated by regional wars and conflicts were laid bare, in all their deleterious fallout, for the whole of humanity to witness. Then on February 24, 2022, Russia launched its so-called “special military operation” in Ukraine, but which 141 of 193 member states of the United Nations (UN) denounced as “military aggression.” The adverse knock-on economic and political turmoil globally was swift, sharp, extremely painful, and continuing to this day. Hundreds of thousands of lives have been lost, and much valuable treasure has been wantonly dissipated by the active participants in this European theater of war.

Globally, and certainly in “our America,” poverty and hunger increased; food insecurity grew exponentially; the entire menu of the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) suffered huge setbacks; living standards in most countries have fallen and are falling further; public and private debt grew geometrically as expenditure soared and revenues fell. Everywhere the faces of men and women grew pained and anxious. They are still in pain and anxious today.

Currently, the economies of Latin America and the Caribbean have been struggling to return to pre-pandemic levels. Some have been successful in this regard; some are making limited progress; and others, yet are in a downward, spiraling descent.

Excellencies, you the informed and sophisticated audience at the Permanent Council of the OAS know in detail the catalogue of the recent travails of our people and understand the proximate and root causes of the debilitating and challenging condition of “our America” as manifested in all people's lives, living, and production. So, there is no further need for me to regale you with a diet of lamentations.

In any event, morning by morning, new mercies we see; all that we need. His hand has provided; great is thy faithfulness.

In the midst of all the dislocations, disasters, suffering and setbacks in “our America,” there is nevertheless a hopefulness and a determination of our populations to turn the setbacks into advances, to avoid a further desecration of our future, to recover, and to rebuild; in short to respair; that is to embrace fresh hope for a recovery and a better condition of life from the condition of dislocations, disruptions, uncertainties, despondency, and despair.

In this quest to respair, the embrace fresh hope, goes to our existential beings; it encompasses, too, faith and love, the trilogy of which are resident in our people’s consciousness as core essences of our Judeo-Christian socialization and the resolute experiences of “our America,” shaped by a social solidarity which emerges from “the genius of our people.”

This “genius of our people” flows from a fluid space in our collective consciousness, conditioned by the fever of our history, awash with possibilities beyond the ordinary, the regular, the normal, the usual. It is this existential spirit and yearning from which we must draw, individually and collectively, in our respairing; it is that which encompasses a social individualism and solidarity beyond, and in contrast to, a limiting atomized individualism of an unfettered market economy and a dog-eat-dog survival of the fittest. A society grounded in naked individualism is unsustainable. At a time of grave challenge which “our America” faces today, it is necessary and desirable to foster our people’s instinctive sense of social solidarity, goodness, and good neighborliness in national unity, not ugly divisiveness, craven dishonesty, and partisan self-interest, in quest of an illusory power.

Indeed, all of us, every single one of us, in our respective societies and across the globe, we are metaphorically on the dangerous road to Jericho.

“Our America” has to be re-energized in its pursuit of a deepening of regional integration and internationalist solidarity steeped in multilateralism and international law, devoid of the hypocrisy of great powers and their yearning for imperium, hegemony, or a facile “manifest destiny”.

“Our America” possesses regional institutional arrangements of its own creation which must be strengthened and refreshed for the current, trying times. There are several noteworthy ones, including: First, the Caribbean Community (CARICOM), a fifteen-member bloc of economic integration and functional cooperation, stretching through the archipelago from The Bahamas in the north to Trinidad and Tobago in the south, and thence to Belize in Central America, and Guyana and Suriname in South America—and of course, it includes Haiti, French-speaking Caribbean, and Suriname, Dutch-speaking, in addition to English speaking member states of CARICOM.

Secondly, the Association of Caribbean States (ACS), a twenty-five-member grouping of countries in the Caribbean and Latin America washed by the Caribbean Sea. El Salvador is a member, though washed by the Pacific Ocean, but El Salvador is so entwined with Central America that you have to be in the Association of Caribbean States. The ACS focusses on functional cooperation in trade, technology, transportation, tourism, and disaster preparedness.

Thirdly, the Southern Common Market (MERCOSUR) with five full members and seven associate members.

Fourthly, the Amazon Cooperation Treaty Organization (ACTO) consisting of eight countries dedicated to preserving and enhancing “the lungs of the world”— the Amazon Forest.

Fifth, the Central American Integration System (SICA) which comprises eight countries.

And sixth, the Bolivarian Alternative for Latin America (ALBA) which consists of nine member-states

And seventh, the thirty-tree-member Community of States of Latin America and the Caribbean (CELAC) which is the premier political integration mechanism for “our America.” Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, as you have heard, currently holds the Pro Tempore Presidency of CELAC.

CELAC, which has an integration focus quite distinct from the mandates of the OAS, and not designed as an alternative to the OAS, and it possesses enormous potential for good. It is very important for me to emphasize, that CELAC was never designed as an alternative to the OAS. It is important for that to be repeated. I will tell you this, the two current leaders in the Hemisphere, in “our America,” who were there in Bahia, were the original idea was broached; the two leaders are my dear brother President Lula and myself. Of course, my brother leader Lula took a sabbatical as you know, and I have been around since 2001. So, I do not want, distinguished Secretary General, for it to noised abroad that CELAC is seeking to replace the OAS. We have different mandates, and I was there at the original design, and I know what CELA is about. It is not about your mandates; it has a different focus.

The member-states of CELAC have a land area of 7.88 million square miles and a population of 650 million; in the aggregate, they have a nominal Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of approximately US$5 trillion. Brazil, the largest economy in CELAC and the twelfth largest globally, has a GDP of US$1.7 trillion; and Mexico, the second largest economy in CELAC and the fifteenth largest globally, has a GDP of US$1.3 trillion.

CELAC is an appropriate vehicle to engage the United States of America (USA) on a range of matters touching and concerning the material and political interests of both CELAC and the USA. Indeed, I am using this forum to indicate something publicly which I have done privately—for a conversation between CELAC and the United States of America. Indeed, when at the Summit of the Americas certain matters were not able to be discussed in a manner in which they ought to be discussed, consequent on the exclusion of three countries in our hemispheric family, that is to say Cuba, Venezuela, and Nicaragua, and consequently some other countries either did not attend or their leaders did not attend. Let us take something of great importance to CELAC and also to the United States America: migration. Howe are you going to discuss migration at any gathering without talking to Cuba, Venezuela, Nicaragua, Mexico, Honduras? We have to be mature and reflective in these questions. That is one, but there are others, which we can talk about.

Similarly, CELAC ought to have an encounter between itself and Canada. CELAC, too, is the preferred mechanism for “our America” to develop joinders and linkages with the European Union as was demonstrated recently in July 2023 at the EU-CELAC Summit in Brussels. In September 2023, on the margins of the United Nations General Assembly, CELAC has planned interfaces with the African Union and India. Indeed, on Wednesday afternoon, I had a preparatory engagement with the Permanent Mission of the African Union in New York. CELAC is also pursuing possible engagements with the Association of Southeast Nations (ASEAN