HAVANA (AP) — Leaders of more than a hundred developing countries representing 80% of the world’s population wrapped up a summit in Cuba on Saturday due to the pandemic and technology gap.
About 114 delegates from the Group of 77 + China Forum — a mechanism created in the 1960s and retaining its name despite an increase in its initial membership — met in Havana on Friday and Saturday.
„Two major changes are underway,” Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva said during the final day’s opening appearance on the digital revolution on the one hand and energy transitions on a global scale. And „a few rich economies can’t shape them, readjusting the dependency relationship between the center and the periphery.”
Lula added that the South must „work together again as we did in the past” to move forward on both of these challenges.
Earlier in the day, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres opened discussions demanding that world powers create a more just order, and even considered that developing countries had „failed”. The G-77 + China is precisely a forum for the global convergence of ideas and policies that will later be brought to the heart of the United Nations.
According to the hosts – China will be the interim chair of the G-77+ until the end of the year and Uganda will take over in 2024 – the delegates showed solidarity in their analysis of the current situation and diagnosis. to act.
Rodolfo Benítez, Director of Multilateral Affairs at the Cuban Ministry of Foreign Affairs, said, „There is agreement on the need to carry out an urgent and deep reform of the archaic international financial structure.
These days, the leaders of all continents and different countries have spoken, from the Colombian Gustavo Pedro and his neighbor of Venezuela Nicolás Maduro or the Honduran Xiomara Castro, to the Palestinian Mahmoud Abbas or the Iranian Vice President for Scientific Affairs Rouholat Dehghani Firoz. Appadi. Many of the participants also made regional or national claims in relation to claims to the great powers.
Li Xi, a member of the Communist Party’s Central Committee, intervened in China, pledging that the country’s government is „committed to creating a technological transition that will allow us to bridge the digital divide.”
The theme of the summit was „Current Development Challenges: The Role of Science, Technology and Innovation” and the idea was to bring positions closer to the discussions at the United Nations.
The final announcement was approved by delegates shortly before the end of Saturday. The document emphasizes the countries’ „concern” about the current „unfair” world order for the populations of developing countries worsened by the Covid-19 pandemic, which is why it „underlines the urgent need for a comprehensive reform of international finance and an „inclusive” architecture.”
Along these lines, the text rejected unilateral measures or sanctions, which rich countries typically seek to impose on underdeveloped countries, and what it described as technological monopolies that would further lag these states.
At the same time, he proposed broader funding for technical problems in poor countries and greater cooperation between the countries of the South. He also proposed a special session of the United Nations on these aspects.
The summit in Cuba comes at a time when the Caribbean nation is facing a strong economic crisis from the pandemic crisis and the escalation of US sanctions. Several delegations used these days to hold meetings with President Miguel Díaz-Canel or his officials from strategic areas such as energy, biotechnology – a strong sector here – or agriculture, the last of which precisely Lula received. Government Palace of the Revolution at the end of the multilateral forum.
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Andrea Rodriguez is on Twitter www.twitter.com/ARodriguezAP