Nicaragua: President Ortega Condemns Peru, Lima Group's Expulsion of Venezuela From Summit of the Americas

The government of Nicaragua has published a letter condemning Peru's decision to exclude Venezuela from the VIII Summit of the Americas, scheduled to take place in April, in Lima, Peru. In the letter, which was made public after Peru’s Foreign Minister Cayetana Aljovín confirmed receipt, on Tuesday urged Peru to reconsider the decision and harshly criticised their anti-peace stance.

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Citing a proclamation signed by members of the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (Caricom)in 2014 by all regional governments. Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega told his Peruvian counterpart, Pedro Pablo Kuczynski (PPK), the banning of Nicolas Maduro is "contrary to the Purposes and Principles of the Charter of the United Nations and the Proclamation of Latin America and the Caribbean as a Zone of Peace." 

Members who signed the proclamation seek to "solve disputes through peaceful means with the aim of uprooting forever the threat or use of force" and committed to observe "their strict obligation not to intervene, directly or indirectly, in the internal affairs of any other State and observe the principles of national sovereignty, equal rights and self-determination of peoples..." according to Ortega.

"Acts like this go against the Legal and Political Foundations that underpin the Summits of the Americas, which seek Equality and Respect among the Member States that, of course, are framed in the Plurality of existing ideologies in the Region. To act differently would be founding a bad precedent that would lead us to regulate the Integration Processes under arbitrary, intolerant and unilateral behavior," Ortega added.

In February, Peru announced the decision to disinvite Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro from the summit after a meeting of the Lima Group, an ad-hoc alliance of 14 countries, which was created in August 2017 to "monitor" Venezuela until the country “returns to democracy.”

The United States has welcomed the move while Venezuela and others have argued that the Group has no power to decide which member states can or cannot attend the Organization of American States, OAS, meeting.

Latin American countries, including Bolivia, Cuba, Ecuador, Uruguay, Antigua and Barbuda, and Nicaragua have shown solidarity with Venezuela.

According to the Peruvian government, the decision to cancel Venezuela’s invitation to the Summitt was taken in observance of “what is established in the Quebec declaration adopted in the III Summit of the American in 2001,” which establishes that any alteration to the democratic order excludes a member’s participation.

However, the announcement by Lima coincided with former U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson's Latin American tour, during which he announced further economic sanctions on Venezuela and hinted at a military coup in the South American country.