LatinNews Daily Report - 10 April 2012

Argentina-Uruguay | Mujica drops by Fernández’s. On 9 April President José Mujica of Uruguay went on an unscheduled visit to Buenos Aires to meet his Argentine counterpart, President Cristina Fernández, amid a regional verbal escalation over Argentina’s increased trade restrictions. Mujica’s visit was intended to bring down the tone of the exchanges after his foreign minister, Luis Almagro, defined Argentina’s trade policy as “schizophrenic”. Mujica was successful by assuring Fernández that Uruguay would not join the 40 countries who took their complaints to the World Trade Organization (WTO) - The two parties agreed that differences should be settled within the Southern Common Market (Mercosur) and the Uruguayan deputy economy minister, Luis Porto, later said the two presidents authorised: a technical study relating to commercial exchanges in the local currencies; and the establishment of mechanisms that resolve trade disputes through “a positive discrimination” towards Uruguayan exports.