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Weekly Report - 19 April 2012 (WR-12-15)

Consensus eludes heads of state as Summit confronts crunch issues

He left no stone unturned but President Juan Manuel Santos of Colombia was unable to win a consensus for a final declaration at the end of the sixth Summit of the Americas in Cartagena de Indias on 15 April. His task, however, was far too great for one man alone. Two hugely contentious issues were thrust right to the heart of the summit’s agenda very late in the day – Cuba and regional drug policy. Still, the fifth Summit of the Americas in 2009 was widely deemed a success even though only the host, Trinidad & Tobago’s Prime Minister Patrick Manning, signed the Declaration of Port of Spain, and the Mar del Plata Summit in 2005 was an unmitigated failure. Santos was adamant this summit was anything but “a failure”, and for Colombia, at least, that was certainly true.

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