Mexico City (CNN) – Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador threatened to boycott the Summit of the Americas next month, saying, Tuesday, that his participation would only be confirmed if the host country, the United States, invited all countries of the hemisphere, including Cuba, Nicaragua and Venezuela.
“The participation in the Los Angeles summit has not yet been resolved because we are proposing not to exclude anyone because we seek the unity of all America,” Lopez Obrador said during his daily press conference in Mexico City.
President Lopez Obrador insisted that all countries of the hemisphere be allowed to attend.
We feel there should be no confrontation. Even with disagreements, we have to talk, all Americans, so we still have to work out this issue. We have a very good relationship with the Biden administration. We want everyone to be invited. This is Mexico’s position.”
American position
US officials have said this over and over again Cuban governmentsNicaragua and Venezuela will not be invited to the summit due to their human rights record.
As the host nation, the United States has the privilege of choosing leaders to invite to the summit.
However, following Lopez Obrador’s comments, the White House said on Tuesday that no decisions had been made.
“We have not made a decision on who to invite and invitations have not yet been issued,” said Jen Psaki, the White House press secretary.
If Lopez Obrador abandons Mexico’s place in the meeting, which will be held in June, it will constitute great contempt for the White House and the administration of US President Joe Biden in particular, who have tried to use the summit as an opportunity to strengthen Latin American relations with the United States, amid growing Chinese interaction in the region.
Lopez Obrador was in Cuba
The Mexican president spoke again in his country after a tour of Central America and Cuba, where he met Cuban President Miguel Diaz-Canel and former President Raul Castro. In Cuba, Lopez Obrador said he would insist Biden not exclude any country in the Americas from the summit.
“I am aware that there are political groups in the United States committed to confrontation, who wish to hold the peoples of Latin America and the Caribbean hostage, as in the case of The embargo against Cubavigorously promoted by Cuban politicians who have great influence in the United States,” said Lopez Obrador.
“But I consider a blockade to be inappropriate and inhuman (…) an entire people cannot suffer for the good of a group, so the US government must make a decision on that because it is a human rights issue, which has to do with sovereignty,” he added.
He added, “If I’m excluded. If not everyone is invited, a representative of the Government of Mexico will go, but I will not go. Foreign Minister Marcelo Ebrard will represent me.”
The Summit of the Americas is traditionally a meeting of countries from North, Central and South America and the Caribbean, held every four years.
Relations between the United States and Cuba have been tense for decades, despite the fact that the two countries held their first high-level talks in four years in April.
Nicaragua and Venezuela are on bad terms with Washington after an extensive list of sanctions against their governments and questionable recent elections.
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