Guido Carelli Lynch
02/06/2020 - 20:04
- Clarín.com
- Politics
In the lobby of the Hotel Regina, a few meters from the Louvre Museum, Alberto Fernández analyzes his first tour as President. In just five days he met with the Pope, with the Prime Minister and the President of Italy, Giuseppe Conte and Sergio Mattarella; with German Chancellor Angela Merkel; with the president of the Spanish government, Pedro Sánchez; and with the French president Emmanuel Macron. “It came out as we wanted it to come out. We at some point feel the need for two things. To raise the need for Europe that is important for us, and secondly to ask Europe what is happening to us, and ask for their help, ”he says, referring to his tour and the preaching for support in debt renegotiation.
- What balance does of its encounter with the European leaders?
-Europe is a huge continent, many of us descend from inhabitants of this continent and fundamentally they are the great investors that Argentina has. Then I am very happy. The meeting with Conte was very valuable, because he had a gesture of much explicit support for us; The dinner with Merkel was formidable. Also, to meet again with Pedro (Sánchez), we are friends and we were both waiting for the moment of being the two presidents and being able to work together. The meeting with Macron was very important for Argentina, because Macron invited me to talk about the future by telling the world: “We are going to support Argentina to get out of this topic before we start talking.” I greatly appreciate your support, your gesture.
- Is the agreement with the IMF closer today with these supports?
-The Fund must see that the world warns what we are proposing and has an executive director in Kristina Georgieva with a great capacity to listen and see. Surely you must be seeing what is happening in Europe, and how Europe wants to meet what Argentina offers as a solution. I believe that there is always an instance of dialogue and negotiation and it seems to me that today we are more accompanied than before. A week ago we felt a little more alone and now we feel very accompanied by the great European powers.
- Did you exchange a message with Georgieva in the framework of this tour where you received so much support for the negotiation?
-No, I know he had a long meeting with Martín (Guzmán) that he told me was very positive. Gustavo (Béliz) also told me last night. So I feel that the imprint is that we begin to tell the world what happened to us, what happens to us and where we want to go. It is very, very healthy for us to know that the world is understanding us.
-Venezuela was a recurring consultation of European leaders. Should the Contadora group return (the multilateral initiative that promoted peace in Central America in the 1980s)?
-I have the impression that in Europe you are seeing Argentina as a country that can have the ability to amalgamate conflict situations normally and help normality not break down in Latin America and work together. One of those issues that worries everyone is the issue of Venezuela, and what I raise today is that we have to find other ways to solve the problem of Venezuela, because - Einstein would say - that if we continue doing the same things we will not have other results . Everything that has been done so far did not serve to achieve a better result. And in that sense, to all the leaders of Europe I have suggested that Europe has to concentrate its efforts on Contadora so that Contadora revives and tries to find a different solution. Today (on Thursday) in the morning I spoke with (Josep) Borrell (High Representative for EU foreign policy), we talked about the issue and we agreed to see how we can join efforts to work there.
- How can be the space to channel the conflict in Venezuela?
- We all believe that the problem of Venezuelans must be solved by Venezuelans and for this we must create a table where Venezuelans sit and recover in dialogue. And Contadora is a good place for that. Venezuela is stagnant and we have to get out of that stalemate and we have to work to get out of that stalemate.
- It thinks that this tour helped to dissipate the doubts that there were on the presumed isolation of Argentina at international level?
-Yes, I feel that it helped a lot so that some who from Europe believed that we had a different vocation would dispel those doubts. I think it also helped many who from within (from Argentina) believed that we were coming to marginalize ourselves from the world. They must be discovering how much they lied to them.
-In the middle of this tour, Axel Kicillof wanted to renegotiate the maturity of a bond and ended up paying and the re-inflation of the national debt in pesos still does not seem to have much adhesion ...
- What happened in the Province is a decision that I share with the governor. We are working in good faith in debt negotiation. That was an expiration that fell early and in dollars. We did not want anyone to think we wanted to defaulte. We really want to find a solution to the debt without falling into default, but we know that the debt is unsustainable and that it will be impossible to meet the obligations. This we know from before assuming, because before we assumed Macri expressed the unsustainability of the debt and that is why he tried the idea of reperfilation and that is why he sent laws asking for authorizations to re-issue, because it was impossible to comply. I fully understand the governor, but it will be very difficult to follow the logic of the governor.
- And the reperfilamiento of the bonds in national currency?
-We have to wait, we have to wait. For the case it is the same. We also have fiscal discipline. We are not going to issue money crazy. We have made a proposal, we hope you understand it, but we will not be issuing currency; less, to pay creditors.
- He spoke of the international isolation Was there a negative assessment of the current vice president in the world? You mentioned it on the Elysium.
-No leader in Europe raised such a thing. Even Merkel several times remembered her as someone very vehement in defending her positions and very intelligent. They never raised it that way. I mentioned Cristina Kirchner, because Macron, in her preliminary speech, talked about Argentine women and how they had had someone very important in Eva Perón. I said it was true, just as we have Cristina's leadership in vast sectors of society, but I said it just because it came to mind. No leader spoke to me about Cristina; Unlike.
-With this tour, did he take away the bastion of Macri's management of a successful foreign policy?
- Macri's? I confess that when one hears European leaders talk about how they felt disappointed by Macri, one realizes that he has nothing successful. Lying to the world is not a good way of doing politics.
-He started in Latin America (before assuming), passed through Israel and continued through Europe. What other trips are coming?
- The world remains. The truth should not be an exception. This is how it should work. We need to explain to Europe - a continent that must be addressed in another way - that it was very important to start as we started. But getting along with Europe does not mean we have to neglect the United States, Mexico, Brazil, China or Russia. As Merkel said, I believe in the multilaterality of international relations. Do not focus on the link with one.
-In his different talks with businessmen he talked about the stocks. Is that a problem to attract investments?
- It is a problem that we have and that we have to look for mechanisms to solve it, to favor that the investment comes to Argentina. It is a problem that we do not generate, that have left us and that must be solved.