The Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs, Edgardo Riveros, attended the Tenth Meeting of the Political Consultation Mechanism with Uruguay, at which opportunity the Vice-Minister of that country, Luis Porto, reviewed the main issues of the bilateral, regional and multilateral agenda.
It should be recalled that in 2008 the then Presidents Michelle Bachelet from Chile, and Tabaré Vázquez from Uruguay, signed a strategic partnership agreement in the framework of which these consultation mechanisms are implemented.
Vice-Minister Riveros expressed satisfaction and gratitude on behalf of the Chilean Government for the fruitful meeting which reaffirms the existing clear and comprehensive relations between the two countries.
The current bilateral consultation mechanism "allows us to foresee the intensification and improvement of relations," he said, adding that they are the first ones that are held after three years.
The fact of acting in the same multilateral mechanisms such as the Union of South American Nations, the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States and the Southern Common Market (Mercosur) is a very important matter, Riveros said, adding that it would be quite beneficial that another instance such as the Pacific Alliance would converge somewhere with Mercosur, the bloc that Uruguay shares with Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Venezuela, and of which Chile is a partner almost since its inception in 1991.
The personal approach with his Uruguayan counterpart, is a value added to the relationship between the countries, said the Vice-Minister, and in that regard, he mentioned the dinner shared the previous evening with Vice President Danilo Astori and the participation of Foreign Minister Almagro in the meeting held last Tuesday.
Finally, he invited Vice-Minister Porto to meet with the Vice-Ministers of Defense to work on the participation and future actions of Uruguay and Chile, among other countries in the peacekeeping mission of the United Nations in Haiti.
At the meeting on Tuesday, in addition to multilateral issues such as rapprochement or insertion into regional blocs to which the two countries belong, bilateral issues were also addressed. In this regard, he noted that the way to move forward in three specific agreements was analyzed: on exchange and cooperation in policies to combat drug trafficking; on exchange of documentation for serious violations of human rights occurred in the recent past and thirdly, on exchange of information in tax matters.
In another vein, he said that the occasion led to the presentation to Chile of the candidacy of Luis Almagro, current Foreign Minister of Uruguay to the General Secretariat of the Organization of American States (OAS), a proposal that Riveros pledged to transmit to the government of his country, again presided over by Bachelet, to be studied by our country on the proposed terms.
"This is not a minor issue for the country as it is part of its foreign policy; the objective is to position Uruguay as a partner in a heterogeneous Latin America, looking for points of consensus on which to work," he said.