Seventh Summit of the Americas to Take Place this Week in Panama
Seventh Summit of the Americas to Take Place this Week in Panama
The Summit is an important opportunity to showcase U.S.-Cuba rapprochement though the question remains on whether any concrete actions will come out of this meeting, comments COA’s Eric Farnsworth.
The seventh Summit of the Americas will be held at the end of this week in Panama City. The event has been held every three years since 1994. It’s a chance for leaders from North, Central and South America to come together and discuss issues affecting the region. Topics expected to be on the agenda include trade, security and migration.
This is the first year that Cuba has been invited to attend the summit. All the Latin American and Caribbean leaders at the last summit, in Colombia in 2012, voted to invite Cuba. The U.S. and Canada have traditionally opposed its presence.....
....“I think the summit is a really important opportunity for the United States and Cuba to show that both countries have turned over a new leaf,” said Farnsworth. “I think the question is going to be what concrete actions come out of this particular meeting.”
He added that another question is what the posture will be of the other countries at the summit. “This isn’t just the United States and Cuba meeting. It’s all the countries of the Western Hemisphere. Some of them are going to be quite focused on the fact that they don’t much like the United States, whether or not there’s a rapprochement with Cuba.” Farnsworth said relations between the U.S. and Venezuela could become a pressing issue during the summit....
