The Guadalajara Summit and the Consolidation of a Strategic Partnership between Latin America and the Caribbean and the European Union

This text underlines the objectives, results and import for Mexico of the Third Summit of Heads of State and Government of Latin America and the Caribbean and the European Union (LAC-EU), held in Guadalajara, Mexico, on May 28 and 29, 2004. The author emphasizes the importance of supporting and strengthening bi-regional cooperation among these nations, while pointing out the relevance of democracy in this process, which he considers essential in the search for greater levels of development. He goes on to highlight the integration and development process European nations have been implementing, and the ways in which sub-regional integration has been promoted on the American continent. Finally, he underscores the preponderant role Latin American and Caribbean nations, and the European Union are likely to play in the creation of a new international order, and how central multilateralism is to this process.