by Lady Michelle-Jennifer Santos, Founder and Publisher

Publisher’s Note: The Santos Republic is the first one to come with this. UNASUR has not given their press conference and they have not come out with a mainstream media spin also. I am giving you information that comes from the President’s office. I also took the liberty of giving you, our dear Faithful, critical documents for your reference so we can all be in the same page as the high level officials and diplomats around the world who are looking into this. We like our TSR Readers to be armed with hardcore knowledge.

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August 19, 2012 (TSR) – As expected, UNASUR unanimously came out in full support for the Ecuadorian Government’s decision on giving Wikileaks founder Julian Assange an asylum and against UK Foreign Minister William Hague’s threats.

In a very tensed day, where dozens of national and international media, like teleSUR, Reuters, EFE, among others add to the special envoys of U.S. and European media such as BBC and CCTV News, U.S were forced to wait in the press room which was  installed in the adjoining room where it was to be announced.

According to the schedule released by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the extraordinary meeting of the council of Ministers of Foreign Affairs of the Union of South American Nations (UNASUR) started at 14:30 (Ecuador)/ 20:30 (London)/15:30 (Washington D.C.). It was attended by the foreign ministers of Colombia, Maria Angela Holguin of Colombia, Nicolás Maduro of Venezuela, Rafael Roncagliolo of Peru, Alfredo Moreno of Chile, Luis Almagro of Uruguay, Hector Timerman Marco of Argentina, and the deputy foreign ministers of Bolivia, Juan Carlos Aludalde of Nicaragua, Antonio Simues of Brazil, among others.

Alí Rodríguez Araque is a Venezuelan politician, lawyer, and diplomat. He is the UNASUR Secretary General as of June 2012.

The meeting was led by Ali Rodriguez, Secretary General of UNASUR, who will give a press conference at 17:00 (Ecuador)/23:00 (London)/18:00 (Washington D.C.).

It is very important to note that Ali Rodriguez, the Secretary General of the Union of South American Nations, UNASUR, was installed this June, and is the former Venezuelan Foreign Affairs minister (2004/2006). He will be holding the post for the next twelve months.

The central theme of the meeting is the rejection of threats by the UK government on the integrity of the Embassy of Ecuador in London and against the sovereign right to manage the South American country of asylum policy.

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The ministers did not have much discussion nor fanfare. After a brief meeting that lasted about 20 minutes, the Regional ministers unanimously decided to fully support Ecuador and condemn the threat from UK following the decision of the South American country to grant diplomatic asylum to Julian Assange.

The resolution entitled “Declaration of Guayaquil” was read by the Secretary General of UNASUR, Ali Rodriguez Araque, who said that after the information provided by the Ecuadorian Government Agency, UNASUR member countries decided to show solidarity with Ecuador to the threat of violation of local diplomatic mission based in London.

The SADC Declaration of Guayaquil

UNASUR’s South American Defense Council (SADC) is a body “based on the principles of non-intervention, sovereignty and territoriality.”

The Council’s creation was approved in December 2008, in an extraordinary summit in Brazil, where the Statute of the UNASUR SADC was signed.

The Statute defines the Council’s main aims as:

1. Consolidating South America as a zone of peace, a base for democratic stability and the integral development of our peoples, and a contribution to world peace.

2. Creating a South American identity in defense issues, incorporating the subregional and national characteristics that strengthen unity between Latin America and the Caribbean.

3. Generating consensus to strengthen regional cooperation on defense issues.

The SADC is made up of the defense ministers of UNASUR’s 12 country members, who carry out annual ordinary meetings. (UNASUR, the Union of South American Nations, is a regional cooperation body founded in 2008, the result of a process that began in 2004.) The Council has an executive body, made of the region’s vice-ministers of defense. The Presidency, charged with coordinating its activities, is exercised by the country that holds UNASUR’s pro tempore presidency – currently, Peru.

The presidency pro témpore directs the eight ministerial councils of the Unasur: South American Council of Health, South American Council of Social Development, South American Council of Infrastructure and Planning , South American Council of Education, Culture, Science, Technology and Innovation; South American Council of Fight against the South American Narcotráfico , Council of Defense South American, South American Council of Economy and Finances, and South American Council.

This ‘Declaration of Guayaquil’ document:

1. “Approved the procedures to implement the confidence-building and security measures”
agreed at earlier meetings.

2. Set up a working group, led by Argentina, Chile and Peru, “to develop a methodology to address technical and design elements of the system for measuring defense expenses in our countries … in order to promote the issue of transparency in defense expenses.”

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UNASUR reiterated the right of states to grant asylum, and also strongly rejected the threat of use of force and highlighted the full observance of the principles enshrined in international law.

According to Article 22 of the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations of 1961, “premises of the mission shall be inviolable. The agents of the receiving State may not enter them without the consent of the Head of Mission. ” Note that United Kingdom is a signatory to the said Convention.

The Vienna Convention of Diplomatic Relations of 1961

UNASUR also repudiated that Britain invoked a local law for not complying with an international obligation. British government officials justified their threat in a legal regulation that bolsters the invasion of Ecuadorian Embassy Act-Diplomatic and Consular Facilities 1987 (Diplomatic and Consular Premises Act 1987) -. Although this law has never been applied.

The UK Diplomatic and Consular Premises Act of 1987

In the statement read in Guayaquil, UNASUR also reiterates the validity of institutions such as asylum and refuge to protect the human rights of people who believe that their life or limb is threatened.

After the meeting, ministers held hands as a sign of Latin American unity, while dozens of national and international media flee the scene.

 

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