The United States said Monday that it was looking for ways to represent the peoples of Cuba, Venezuela and Nicaragua at the next Summit of the Americas after threats of a boycott due to the exclusion of the governments of those three Latin American nations.
“We are still evaluating options on how to best incorporate the voices of the Cuban, Venezuelan and Nicaraguan peoples into the Summit process,” an administration official said.
The State Department has expressed confidence in a “robust” turnout in Los Angeles, but has so far not released the guest list.
The top US official for Latin America, Brian Nichols, said earlier that he did not expect invitations to officials from Cuba, Nicaragua and Venezuela, because “they do not respect the 2001 Inter-American Democratic Charter.”
Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador has threatened to boycott the summit if the United States does not invite all countries. Since then, the leaders of Argentina, Bolivia, Honduras and the 14-nation Caribbean bloc have also questioned his participation. Chile has joined the calls for the greatest possible participation.
Mexican Foreign Secretary Marcelo Ebrard said López Obrador raised the issue in virtual conversations last week with former US Senator Chris Dodd, Biden’s special adviser for the Summit.
“It was a pretty frank conversation,” Ebrard said. The Mexican president, he stressed, made it clear that “there should be no exclusions” and that the region was ready to “enter a new historical stage” of unity similar to the European Union.
Another question is whether Biden will invite the Venezuelan Juan Guaidó, whom Washington considers the legitimate president of Venezuela.
Cuba was invited to the summits in Panama (2015) and Peru (2018).
