US embassy cable - 04TEGUCIGALPA172

UNCLAS TEGUCIGALPA 000172 
 
SIPDIS 
 
FOR WHA/PD, WHA/CEN, AND IIP/G/WHA 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: OIIP, KPAO, KSUM, PREL, HO 
SUBJECT: MEDIA REACTION ON THE SPECIAL SUMMIT OF THE 
AMERICAS, JANUARY 15, 2004 
 
1. Editorial in Tegucigalpa-based moderate daily "El 
Heraldo" on 1/15 entitled "A great deal of rhetoric and few 
results".  "The Latin American presidents arrived in 
Monterrey with few expectations, and they came back with 
their hands practically empty.  More than ever, this Summit 
was characterized by meaningless speeches and vain promises. 
It went by without the creation of concrete measures to 
concretize the good intentions of the governments to `focus 
on the most vulnerable social sectors and increase the 
efforts to reduce poverty and social inequality'." 
 
"It also clear that the conflicts between Latin America and 
the Northern colossus in several issues, such as the FTAA, 
and the relationship of certain nations with the Cuban 
government still remain." 
 
"One of the positive developments of this Summit was the 
agreement to reduce the costs of sending remittances from 
the immigrants to their countries of origin, which benefits 
millions of families and the financial systems of these 
countries." 
 
2. Editorial in San Pedro Sula-based liberal daily "La 
Prensa" on 1/15 entitles "Just another declaration".  "The 
Summit of the Americas ended with yet another declaration of 
the good intention of our governments.  The conclusions of 
the final declaration were mainly focused on political 
issues, neglecting once again the severe problem of poverty 
and unemployment in the hemisphere.  The Declaration of 
Nuevo Leon is only one more document that didn't answer the 
key question of this region: how can Latin America finally 
achieve a stable development?." 
 
"One of the novelties of this Summit, although it's still 
just a theoretical proposal, is the commitment of all 
governments to reduce in half the costs of sending 
remittances.  This is a concrete goal.  However, there's 
still a need to propose effective measures to compete with 
the big transnational companies that receive enormous 
profits from the remittances sent to Latin America." 
 
3. Editorial in San Pedro Sula-based liberal daily "Tiempo" 
on 1/15 entitled "Uneventful".  "The Summit of the Americas 
ended without any particular development, fulfilling one of 
the expectations the people of the hemisphere had on this 
event." 
 
"The Declaration of Nuevo Leon is full of expressions of 
support and willingness to fight against poverty, 
corruption, terrorism, narcotrafficking, and the illegal 
traffic of arms, but few of them can actually be fulfilled 
by the Latin American governments." 
 
Palmer