Mexico snub jolts Biden's summit plans

LOS ANGELES－US President Joe Biden's plan to reboot his country's engagement with Latin America took a hit after key partner Mexico snubbed a regional summit that opened in Los Angeles on Monday. His Mexican counterpart, Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, took the action in protest over Washington's exclusion of three countries.

The White House said it was not inviting Cuba, Nicaragua and Venezuela to the Summit of the Americas.

In response, Lopez Obrador said he would stay away. "You cannot have a Summit of the Americas if you do not have all the countries of the Americas attending," the Mexican president said in complaining about US "hegemony" and "lack of respect for nations".

Lopez Obrador was one of several leaders who threatened to stay away if not all countries in the region were invited. He said policies of "exclusion" that had been imposed "for centuries" needed to change, criticizing what he called an unjustified desire for "domination".

Lopez Obrador's absence will diminish the impact of a summit where US-Mexico relations are at the heart of major immigration and trade issues. The White House downplayed the spat, saying Biden was sticking up for principles, but that there was no bad blood between the neighbors.

Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro said on Monday that the United States' decision to exclude the three nations' leaders from the summit was "an act of discrimination "and that the US government "has ensured the summit would fail".

Cuba President Miguel Diaz-Canel said last month he would not go even if invited, accusing the US of "brutal pressure" to make the summit noninclusive.

The Cuban government said on Monday in a statement that there is no single reason to justify the US government's "undemocratic and arbitrary exclusion" of any country of the hemisphere from the summit.

What was meant to be a weeklong showcase of cooperation risks becoming a display of division, underlining diminishing US clout over a region where Washington has longtime economic and diplomatic influence.

Low expectations

Faced with low expectations for summit achievements, US officials began previewing Biden's coming initiatives.

They include an "Americas partnership" for pandemic recovery, which would entail investments and supply-chain strengthening, reform of the Inter-American Development Bank, and a $300 million commitment for regional food security.

Biden is scheduled to fly to Los Angeles on Wednesday. The agenda on Wednesday will focus on regional economic and health issues, then climate change on Thursday. Friday will be devoted to the surge in migration to the US－a major concern for US voters and an area where Republican opponents see Biden as vulnerable in the upcoming midterm congressional elections.

The issue of migration is set to loom large at the summit.

Pandemic-era restrictions that allow the summary rejection of an asylum claim remain in force at the border, despite plans by Biden to scrap them.

The so-called Title 42 can automatically bar entry to anyone without a visa, but at an informal border crossing in sun-scorched Yuma, the vast majority of those arriving are still able to lodge a claim for asylum, either because of the makeup of their family, the country they came from or the danger they face.

As the summit kicked off, thousands of migrants left southern Mexico on Monday with the intention of heading north.

Migrants chanted "Freedom!" and "We want visas!" and carried small flags from Venezuela, Nicaragua and Honduras as they set off on the 3,000-kilometer journey to the US border.

"Migrants are not criminals, we're international workers," read one banner.

Agencies - Xinhua