By Dalia González Delgado


When Latin Americans listened to Barack Obama's presidential campaign in 2008, they thought that maybe Washington's foreign policy towards the region might change.

In 2009, a few months after occupying the Oval Office, Obama tried to enthuse everyone in the 5th Summit of the Americas in Trinidad and Tobago. There he shook hands with Hugo Chavez, and said that it was time to develop a relationship "between equals". "Sometimes we tried to impose our conditions," he said. "We may be wrong, we admit it; we're human."

But that was just a face wash, because, in essence, the White House policy has not changed. They are still trying to destroy, or at least slow down all the processes of change in the continent.

The most recent example is what happened with the president of Bolivia, Evo Morales, who was virtually kidnapped in Europe for almost 15 hours.

Granma consulted Hugo Moldiz Mercado, a Bolivian academic, lawyer, broadcaster and specialist in International Relations.

Do you think that the European governments acted voluntarily, or is it true that the U.S. was behind it all?

"Within a week of this event, that will be a milestone in world history of the decline of international order, it can be said that the United States was from the beginning behind the operation mounted against President Evo Morales. First, they are the only ones concerned about the revelations that Edward Snowden could keep making about mega-operations of the U.S. secret services in the world, which violate the privacy rights of its own citizens and even of European countries. "

"Moreover, the U.S. is the only one with a leadership able to align all its NATO partners in an operation such as was developed on July 2. Another reason to think that they are responsible is the information that is beginning to emerge in Austria, where Die Presse, a very serious newspaper, revealed that the U.S. ambassador to the country was the one who started a rumor that Snowden was on Evo Morales’ presidential plane ".

In your view, how will this incident affect relations between Bolivia and the United States?

"Bolivian-US relations are in the process of deterioration. This is due to the constant interference of the embassy of the United States and its intelligence agencies in our domestic affairs, either overtly or covertly, through, for example, the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) and the National Endowment for Democracy (NED) ".

"Since 2008, when Bolivia expelled Ambassador Goldberg for encouraging right-wing conspirators in their undemocratic desires, the links have not improved. the Framework Agreement signed between the two countries less than two years ago to build state-to-state relationships of mutual respect,  non-interference and shared responsibility in the fight against drug trafficking, has not been fulfilled by the United States, which keeps pressing the country. Revelations in the Bolivian weekly La Epoca report covert actions in Bolivia by the CIA and the U.S. anti-drug agency DEA. "

What do you think about the reaction of Latin America to what happened?

"The reaction has been generally positive. Outrage has been categorical by peoples and also by many states and governments. I believe that the attack on Evo Morales has been taken as an aggression against all of Latin America. Of that there is no doubt ".

"But the United States is operating in the region with more force than before, and has tried at least to minimize what happened. At the meeting of UNASUR in Bolivia, it is quite suggestive that the presidents of Colombia, Peru and Chile - the three most involved in the Pacific Alliance project, which is the return of the FTAA by another name- did not attend."