Pressure as they have, U.S. diplomats and military officers have not succeeded in turning Ibero-America and Caribbean against China and its Belt and Road Initiative.
More than 300 Ibero-American, Caribbean, and Chinese businessmen, representing some 150 companies, participated in the XVth annual China-LAC Businessmen’s Summit on Dec. 14-15. Co-sponsored by China’s International Trade Promotion Council (CCPIT) and the Ecuadorian Ministry of Production, Foreign Trade, Investment and Fishing, the hybrid in-person/online summit was opened by President Guillermo Lasso — a conservative former banker who professes support for NATO and was visiting Biden at the White House a few days later (12/19) — by describing the Latin America-Caribbean (LAC) region, with its 662 million inhabitants, as “very interconnected with the People’s Republic of China.”
The “Guayaquil Initiative” statement, issued at the end of the summit, endorsed the Belt and Road Initiative as key to fostering interconnectivity, which in turn unleashes development potential, for everyone’s “mutual benefit and win-win.” Scientific and technological R&D and “innovation” were also cited as key areas for cooperation.
