Caribbean & Central America - October 2011 (ISSN 1741-4458)

President Mauricio Funes took a tougher line on the US during his speech at the UN General Assembly on 23 September than might have been expected. Eight days earlier US President Barack Obama had placed El Salvador on a drug-trafficking blacklist for the first time in the country’s history. The timing of the US action was unfortunate as El Salvador also celebrated its independence on 15 September. Funes, who stressed that “the fight against organised crime is a common struggle,” said that consumer countries like the US had “a moral responsibility” to attack what was both a criminal and health problem. He was also fiercely critical of the US embargo of Cuba and spent some time justifying El Salvador’s decision to recognise Palestine.

El Salvador has been the staunchest ally of the US in Latin America over the last two decades. Even after the Right’s stranglehold on power came to an end in 2009 with the electoral victory of Funes, the relationship did not really miss a beat as the moderate new head of state rejected any viscerally anti-American policy proposals of the left-wing Frente Farabundo Martí para la Liberación Nacional (FMLN) which brought him to power. Funes did preside over the improvement of ties with Cuba but by this point El Salvador stood alone in Latin America in not having forged ties with Havana.

It would be wrong to portray the blacklisting of El Salvador by the US as a watershed in bilateral relations. Funes has been forthright before in calling for the US to take the lead in fighting not just drug trafficking but also consumer demand at home. It was also not as if El Salvador was singled out: Costa Rica, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua and Panama were already on the blacklist and Belize was also placed on it along with El Salvador. But the choice of topics in Funes’ speech betrayed some of his irritation.

Funes implicitly criticised El Salvador’s blacklisting by calling for the US to “lead with great resolve” and to apply all of its considerable economic, human, technological and political resources to what he described as the “harshest” war in the region. He argued that while Central American countries were making determined efforts to combat the scourge of drug trafficking - strengthening institutions, reforming security forces and working to keep youth out of criminal gangs - they were no match for drug cartels which he said had more money and influence than the sub-region’s own governments. He said the drug trade was an economically powerful form of terrorism and that the sub-region, afflicted by weak economies of scale, extensive poverty and inequality, was simply incapable of combating it alone. “We are true victims of organised crime,” he said.

But it was Funes’ other choice of issues during his speech which revealed the extent of his pique. He blasted the US embargo of Cuba as “an anachronism”, a stumbling block that weakened the region and must end. This would have been music to the ears of the FMLN. Funes presided over the restoration of diplomatic relations with Cuba shortly after he took power in 2009, but to be this frank about the US embargo in a forum as public and resonant as the UN General Assembly was eye-catching (see sidebar).

Funes also devoted a significant part of his speech to discussing El Salvador’s decision to recognise the State of Palestine. “Recognizing Palestine as a new State in the United Nations is, in my opinion, the right way to contribute to resolving this conflict,” he said. It was noteworthy what did not make it into the speech: Funes did not allude, for instance, to his decision in August, approved by the right-wing opposition in congress but denounced by several deputies in the FMLN, to send a contingent of 22 soldiers to assist NATO in training Afghanistan’s security forces. This was apparently a direct request from US President Barack Obama; Funes might have been hoping for more in return.

• Cuba

El Salvador sealed a trade agreement with Cuba on 20 September allowing some 70% of products to have duty-free access. Two-way trade is currently miniscule: El Salvador sent just US$3.08m of exports to Cuba in 2010 and received back a mere US$126,193 worth of Cuban goods. The day after the deal was signed a new air connection was launched, with the first direct flight between San Salvador and Havana. There will now be a thrice-weekly service operated by the airline Avianca-TACA.