Mexico City (EFE).- The Mexican president, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, revealed this Thursday that he has summoned the Latin American leaders to an anti-inflation economic and commercial alliance that would initially include Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Cuba and Honduras.
“We are going to carry out an anti-inflation plan, mutual aid for growth, for commercial economic exchange with Latin American countries,” López Obrador announced at his daily press conference.
The Mexican president reported that, “for this purpose,” he spoke the day before with the presidents of Brazil, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva; from Colombia, Gustavo Petro; from Cuba, Miguel Díaz-Canel, and from Argentina, Alberto Fernández.
“We lack calls, although Alberto Fernández promised to do so with the president of Chile and with the president of Bolivia, Gabriel Boric and Luis Arce, and I am going to speak today with Mrs. Xiomara Castro from Honduras,” he added.
Without revealing even more details of the alliance and the countries that have accepted, López Obrador announced a virtual meeting with these heads of state for April 5.
“First this meeting and then it will be face-to-face, but the foreign ministers, the secretaries of the Treasury, the Economy, and Commerce are going to start working to seek exchanges in the import and export of food and other goods, with the purpose of face the high cost of life together”, he deepened.
Inflation does not subside in Mexico
López Obrador unveiled this proposal while the rise in prices does not subside in Mexico, which registered general inflation of 7.91% in January, the highest for a start to the year in two decades, after 7.82% in December, the highest closing of the year so far this century.
The Mexican ruler recognized the difficulty in dealing with rising food prices, although he argued that the rise in prices is a “world phenomenon” that “is precipitated by the war in Ukraine.”
For this reason, he commented that the alliance “has to do with food, obtaining prices, removing tariffs, barriers that prevent obtaining food at a good price for the internal market of the countries.”
Questioned by other governments that could join, López Obrador asked to wait.
“We are starting, we are going to start like this, and little by little it is going to expand, it is an economic, commercial agreement, we are going to invite producers, distributors, merchants, importers, those who sell, those who buy,” he said.
Although Mexico is one of the countries with the most free trade agreements in the region, more than 80% of its trade is concentrated in the United States.
