THE UNDERSECRETARY FOR LATIN AMERICA AND THE CARIBBEAN MAKES A WORKING VISIT TO GUATEMALA

The Undersecretary for Latin America and the Caribbean, Vanessa Rubio Marquez, made a working visit to Guatemala, where she met with the Deputy Ministers of Foreign Affairs, Ambassadors Carlos Raul Morales Moscoso and Rita Claverie de Sciolli.

Also present were the Ambassador of Guatemala to Mexico, Fernando Andrade Diaz-Duran, and Ambassador Jose Luis Chea Urruela, Presidential Commissioner for the Mesoamerica Project. The meeting was held to review key parts of the bilateral relationship and to agree on priorities for the coming years.

Both presidents, Enrique Peña Nieto and Otto Perez Molina, give priority to the strategic relationship and the need to strengthen it through concrete results in each of the areas of common interest.

They welcomed the dynamic nature of the relationship and agreed on the following priorities: prosperity, social development and security, trade and investment, integration, infrastructure and border development, migration, culture and tourism.

They agreed to integrate these areas into two major initiatives: one to enhance development cooperation and another to move towards a more integrated, prosperous and secure region between Mexico—especially its southern and southeastern states—and Guatemala.

They will continue their consultations with a view to the forthcoming visit of President Otto Perez Molina to Mexico as part of the Crusade against Hunger in Mexico and the Zero Hunger Program in Guatemala.  They also agreed to hold the next meeting of the Binational Commission in Mexico at the ministerial level. Before that meeting, the deputy ministers will lead delegations on a tour of the border in order to assess the situation there.

They agreed to hold an ongoing dialogue on regional issues of interest to both governments and to work together to ensure the success of the 43rd OAS General Assembly that will be held in Antigua, Guatemala, from June 4-6, 2013.

Undersecretary Rubio was accompanied by a delegation consisting of the Directors General for Latin America and the Caribbean and for the Mesoamerica Project, and by the Mexican ambassador. She also met with the Vice President of the Congressional Foreign Affairs Committee; the Minister of Social Development; the Deputy Ministers for Security, Communications, Transportation and Public Works, Environment and Economy, and the Executive Secretary of the Fight against Smuggling and officials from the Tax Administration.