The US government officially confirmed that
next Wednesday President Joe Biden will receive his Argentine counterpart Alberto Fernández
at the White House, information that had been reported in Buenos Aires, but had not yet been endorsed in Washington.
The boss of La Rosada is expected to arrive in the United States this Sunday, direct from the Dominican Republic.
In a statement after 10 p.m. in the US capital, the Biden government announced that “on March 29, after the conclusion of the first day of the second Democracy Summit, President Joe Biden will receive President Alberto Fernández de Argentina for a bilateral meeting at the White House," said press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre.
The news caused relief among the government delegation in Santo Domingo, where President Fernández is attending the Ibero-American Summit.
Everything was already programmed and the agendas were almost ready in the United States, but the official confirmation from the White House had not arrived and the ghost of a postponement, as happened last year due to Biden's Covid, hovered over.
The White House highlighted that Fernández arrives in the middle of the Democracy Summit that the US is organizing with five other nations virtually.
The Argentine president has already recorded a message and will participate virtually in that forum.
The statement specified that "the presidents will celebrate 200 years of bilateral relations between the United States and Argentina and will reiterate the strength of the association between the United States and Argentina."
They also outlined some items on the agenda: “They will discuss how the United States and Argentina can continue to partner to address
global challenges and continue to advance areas of mutual national interest, including critical minerals, climate change, space, and technology.
They will also discuss economic cooperation, as well as their shared values of inclusion, democracy and protection of human rights."
It is known that Fernández will not arrive in Washington directly, but will travel to New York from the Dominican Republic first.
On Sunday night he will arrive in Manhattan, where he has scheduled a meeting on Monday at the Council of the Americas, the think tank headed by Susan Segal, where she will see businessmen with interests in Argentina.
On Tuesday he will be joined in New York by Economy Minister Sergio Massa and then they will travel together to Washington for the long-awaited bilateral with Joe Biden at the White House.
It is
a "working visit",
in which it is customary for the two leaders to meet alone in the Oval Office and then move to another larger room where the teams join.
There will participate Massa, Foreign Minister Santiago Cafiero, Ambassador Jorge Argüello plus some US officials who have not yet been identified.
It is presumed that Secretary of State Antony Blinken will participate and there are hopes that Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen will appear, with whom key issues should be discussed such as the program with the International Monetary Fund, which is being very complicated by the drought .
From Argentina they will raise issues related to climate change, energy, mining, food security, all issues that are of great interest to the Democratic government as well.
This summit is highly desired by Fernández,
who gave instructions to Ambassador Argüello to achieve it from minute zero of his mandate.
The head of La Rosada always sought to establish himself as a regional interlocutor, someone who can speak with all the presidents of different ideological trends.
But the management was complicated when the bilateral relationship became tense when the Argentine toured Russia and China and said that Argentina would be Moscow's gateway to the region.
However, after ironing out differences, the meeting was scheduled for July of last year.
But days before it took place, Biden was infected with covid and
the summit was postponed twice due to that issue
.
Then came the US elections in November and Fernández's loss of power seemed to freeze the appointment that now everything indicates that it will finally take place.
