Something unusual happened
in Fort Lauderdale
last week.At the Organization of
American States’ (OAS) General Assembly, which brought together senior
ministers from the 34 OAS member states from June 5 to 7, an American proposal
to reform the organization’s charter was soundly rejected.
This was the first OAS
General Assembly held in the U.S. in 30 years, with the Americans stressing the
important initiative they would present to OAS member-states for weeks leading
up to the meeting.
The U.S. draft
proposal, entitled “Declaration of Florida: Delivering the Benefits of
Democracy” was, according to U.S. Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice, necessary
to strengthen democracies in the region.Short on specifics while long on descriptions of the importance of
democratic elections and the free-market economy, the draft also contained a
proposal for the creation of an unspecified mechanism for the “application of
the Inter-American Democratic Charter”. While both Rice and U.S. President Bush
said this mechanism would allow the OAS to take “concrete measures” to assist “democracies
in trouble”, it was clear that the majority of OAS members saw it as a means
for further U.S.
intervention in their internal affairs.The American proposal was rejected by 28 countries and a quickly
cobbled-together and slightly watered down Chilean proposal was also rejected.
(Canada accepted the U.S. proposal
in principle but also helped draft the Chilean counter-proposal).The countries which opposed the proposal
stated quite clearly that the document was too interventionist and threatened
the sovereignty of member states.
The rejection of the
proposal was unusual because the establishment of the OAS was led by the
Americans in 1948 primarily as means to ensure their dominance in the Americas. To
date that is the role the organization has played.The U.S.
also established the OAS as a means to crush strong revolutionary movements
within many of the countries of the Americas, and through the organization
has provided tacit approval to over a dozen military and fascist
dictatorships.
While the OAS founding charter
officially enshrines principles of democracy and non-intervention, members have
always understood that both these principles were subject to U.S.
approval.So, for example, members
allowed the U.S. to have Cuba ejected
from the OAS following the success of the Cuban revolution for the so-called
anti-democratic nature of the Cuban people’s revolutionary government.For decades afterwards, the OAS turned a
blind eye as the U.S.
government tried repeatedly to overthrow the Cuban government or assassinate
Fidel Castro, while welcoming the likes of Pinochet, Noriega, Somoza, Batista
and others to address meetings of the OAS General Assembly.
For 57 years, the
organization has served as a virtual rubber stamp for U.S. imperialist foreign policy, a rubber stamp
which the U.S.
so takes for granted that it has not even seen the need to host a General
Assembly meeting since 1974.
Bush, apparently without
irony, noted in his speech to the Assembly that in 1974, fewer than half the
OAS members had democratically elected governments- without exception, these dictatorships were
backed financially and militarily by the U.S.
“The dramatic gains for
democracy we have witnessed in our hemisphere must not be taken for granted,”
Bush said, urging OAS members to accept the American proposal.“In the new Americas of the 21st century,
bringing a better life to our people requires choosing between two competing
visions. One offers a vision of hope. It is founded on representative
government, integration into the world markets, and a faith in the
transformative power of freedom in individual lives.”
In an apparent reference to
progressive governments elected in Venezuela,
Argentina and Uruguay, Bush
said that the other vision “seeks to roll back the democratic progress of the
past two decades by playing to fear, pitting neighbour
against neighbour and blaming others for their own
failures to provide for their people.”
Bush and Rice were visibly
shocked, both by the rejection of the U.S. proposal and the open way in
which OAS representatives condemned it.
Brazilian Foreign Minister
Celso Amorim said that “cooperation and dialogue, rather than interventionist
mechanisms, should be the key concepts,” governing any application of the
Democratic Charter in OAS member-states, while a spokesperson for Mexican
President Vicente Fox told reporters “When it comes to democracy, in principle
we are not in agreement with any tutelage from anybody.”
Venezuela's Foreign Minister Alí
Rodriguez said the founding charter of the OAS is “extremely clear with respect
to non-intervention in the internal affairs of member-states, the right to
elect governments without external interference.”The American proposal, he said, was an
attempt by the Americans to justify their attempts to overthrow the
democratically elected Chavez government in Venezuela.“The OAS does not have the power to evaluate
the state of democracy in the region’s countries," Rodriguez said, adding
“democracy can thrive in many ways as long as those forms honour
universal principles such as freedom of speech and respect for human
rights."
There was also strong
opposition to the American proposal from the CARICOM countries, who pointed to
the U.S. removal of the elected Haitian President Jean-Bertrand Aristide as an
example of the kind of ‘democratic intervention’ they felt the American
proposal would endorse.Discussions on
the American proposal concluded with a resolution for CARICOM members, working
with representatives from Venezuela,
Argentina, Brazil and Surinam,
to draft an alternative proposal on strengthening democracy in the Americas for
presentation to the next OAS General Assembly.