Despite being charged with crimes against humanity, Miguel Díaz-Canel will attend the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC) Summitconfirmed media from Argentina, location of the meeting that will start next Tuesday.
According to Argentine Foreign Ministry sources quoted by Buenos Aires newspaper La Nación, the Cuban president will be in the country, although the note gave no further details.
The same report noted this Nicolás Maduro will also be present, involved in the same process, supported by politicians and artists from Argentina and leaders of the Venezuelan oppositiongathered around the Argentine Forum for Democracy in the Region (FADER).
Daniel Ortega is excludedanother of the accused who will send his chancellor Denis Moncada.
Apart from the trio of well-known rulers, Buenos Aires confirmed the presence of most South American Presidents, except for Andrés Manuel López Obrador, who usually does not leave his country; Peruvian Dina Boluarte, who sent a note alluding to the “vacuum in constitutional norms” Peru is going through; and Ecuadorian Guillermo Lasso, who distanced himself after the frustrated asylum request from Argentina for Rafael Correa’s former associate, María de los Ángeles Duarte.
The latter will be replaced by Ecuadorian Foreign Minister Juan Carlos Holguín.
A delegation sent by Joe Biden will also attend the meeting.Led by Senator Chris Dodd, Special Advisor to the US President for America, and officials from the State Department and National Security Council, and another from Beijing.
According to La Nación, demonstrations are expected against Maduro, who has been called for arrest by leaders of Argentina’s opposition party Together for Change if he enters the country.
“If Nicolás Maduro comes to Argentina, he must be arrested immediately for crimes against humanity. As happened with Pinochet in London in 1998. The judiciary must act to protect the universality of human rights,” he demanded Patricia Bullrichleader of the faction.
In response, Argentina’s foreign ministry argued that unlike Pinochet, Maduro had “no international arrest warrant.”
The official body itself had assured that if traveling on an official plane, there was “no way” that the device would be confiscated, as was the case with a Conviasa plane, the Venezuelan airline sanctioned by the United States.
Havana had expressed the same concern to Buenos Aires days earlier, as Díaz-Canel would be traveling on a plane owned by that company.and asked Alberto Fernández’s government for guarantees that the plane would not be impounded.
Likewise, the Center for the Opening and Development of Latin America (CADAL) announced the holding of a “virtual counter-summit” and called for the release of political prisoners in Cuba, Venezuela and Nicaragua.
During the previous CELAC Summit held in Mexico in September 2021, Diaz-Canel played in a duel with Luis Lacalle, the President of Uruguaywho questioned the oppression on the island and sang a verse from “Patria y vida,” a song that became the anthem of Cubans who hate the regime.