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March 5, 2025 - Epoch Times
29:02
How Paraguay Can Lead the Way in Latin America: Foreign Minister Rubén Ramírez Lezcano
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A few weeks ago, I had the pleasure of sitting down with the president of Paraguay, Santiago Pena.
He shared why Paraguay is one of only 12 countries in the world to recognize Taiwan instead of communist China, and one of only six countries in the world to have moved their embassies from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.
We cannot put economic interests ahead of the values and the principles.
Now, I'm sitting down with his foreign minister, Ruben Ramirez-Lascano, to learn more about Paraguay.
The region, and Lascano's candidacy for Secretary General of the Organization of American States, OAS. I think that America abandoned a lot of time in Latin America.
In the last year, the United States lost a lot of market, a lot of investment, and a lot of opportunities.
I think that that is the time to work close again.
This is American Thought Leaders, and I'm Jan Jekielek.
Minister Ruben Ramirez-Lezcano, such a pleasure to have you on American Thought Leaders.
Really, John, it's a pleasure to be here in your program with your audience.
All the best.
Welcome to America here in the U.S. Since the inauguration of President Trump, it seems to me like the State Department has been quite active.
The Secretary of State, Rubio, and President Trump himself has been quite active on issues related to Latin America and perhaps Paraguay as well.
So how do you view what's happened in the last 20 days?
The frail soul is a very clear message that Latin America matters for the government of President Trump.
And Marco Rubio, coming from a Latin family, He is very clear about the future of our relations.
I think that the recent visit of Secretary Rubio to Central America is starting the relation among the region in which the United States was very absent in the last years.
You yourself have announced your candidacy for the Secretary General of the Organization of American States.
So I think you're viewing this both from a Paraguayan perspective, but also from a broader perspective.
Yes.
Well, my candidacy responds to the prioritization that President Santiago Peña gave to the multilateral system.
And also...
With the fundamentals of our principles and values about freedom, about human rights, democracy, and rule of law.
The Organization of American States is an organization that was created in 1948 but was born before of that with the inter-American system.
And that is quite important for us because our main proposal is the integration.
Not only in economy, on trade, but also political integration.
So there's a lot of suspicion of multilateral institutions, clearly here in the U.S. with the U.S. recently withdrawing from the WHO, UN Human Rights Council.
Maybe explain to me why this multilateral structure of the OAS is so important for you.
It's important because we are discussing about four pillars for the development and for the political stability in our hemisphere.
The first one, democracy.
We need to extend democracy.
In the last years, the OAS lost three country members, Venezuela, Nicaragua, and Cuba, the first one.
We need to work strengthening the institution, working on education, on democracy, and strengthening the election system program that we have in Latin America.
Yesterday we celebrated the election in Ecuador, for example.
And that means that it's quite important to have all the institutions supporting those democratic processes.
Secondly, we are working on human rights.
Human rights is very important because deal not only with democracy, deal also with development because job opportunities, the income of the people in their own countries, and dealing also with security issues.
Those four pillars that we are talking about, democracy, human rights, development, sustainable, and also...
Security are the most important challenges that we have in our hemisphere.
And those challenges don't have any relation with the size of the country.
They have a relation with the needs of every country.
The United States is dealing with security.
Migration is dealing with trade.
The exchange.
And that means that we have, we need the space to debate and to build consensus among those countries in our hemisphere.
The Western Hemisphere is quite important, not only for our country, but also for the United States.
Well, right, clearly, because of this interest that we've just been describing, of course.
and you know let's talk about the migration situation for a moment so there's been a lot of movement of course you know over the last recent years into America from Latin America broadly some specific countries Guatemala and notably but what about now there's going to be a return right and that's actually kind of a huge operation that it's not really clear how it's going to work
that is the reason why OAS is important because we need we understand Each country has the sovereignty to deal with the illegal people that came to their territory.
We need to discuss how to deal with those challenges.
And those challenges have two relations with the democracy.
Why democracy, you say?
Well, we are looking how the situation in Venezuela Eight million of Venezuelans going outside the country.
Eight million.
And the impact is not only in the United States.
It's in Peru, it's in Chile, it's in Ecuador, and that is a challenge for the whole hemisphere.
Have relation with the development.
The development challenge means that people are going to look for the opportunity.
To get jobs, to get better wellness in other countries.
Have relations with the human rights.
When the democracy is weak in a country, the human rights don't have the safe.
And have relations with security also.
Because you have human trafficking, or traffic of people.
You have drug trafficking, laundry money, you have the challenge of the crime organizations, institutions, and institutions because they became multinationals.
They are more integrated than the states.
And we have several organizations, multinationals.
Premier Comando Capital from Brazil, Comando Vermelho from Brazil, Tren de Aragua from Venezuela.
They are working in the whole hemisphere.
And there are other cartels working.
The most important is to have the conditions to discuss the solutions to this challenge and the solution through the integrations of our territories.
With the organizations, not only the institution, the financial institution, to give the financial support to the program, but also we need our security system in our country to work with that.
You know, you raise a really interesting point that I don't think a lot of people even grasp, that some of these...
What we here call gangs, right, are actually, you know, function more like multinational enterprises, almost like a corporation with, you know, lawless corporation or, you know, transnational but bigger than even some states in Latin America.
Absolutely.
It's a huge thing.
And then you have the corruption because those operations of the organized crime Organizations, they are dealing with all the resources that they have.
And they are working on money, they are working in weapon traffic, they are working also in human traffic.
I mean, it's amazing the challenge that we have before us.
And the only way to deal with this problem is altogether the government against those organizations.
Well, this is a good opportunity to talk a little bit about Paraguay.
So, you know, a lot of people don't know that much about Paraguay and that it is, of course, a very strong democracy.
And why don't you tell me what the lessons of Paraguay can...
First of all, Paraguay, all the history have had a foreign policy based on principles.
Democracy, human rights, rule of law, and freedom.
Well, at the same time, we worked very, very heavily.
To keep, again, democracy.
We have had the oldest dictatorship in Latin America, the regime of Alfredo Stroessner during 35 years.
Last February 2nd, we accomplished 36 years of democracy.
The difference among a regime of Stroessner when, at the end, The Paraguay were 60% of the population on the poverty.
And up to now, we are proud to have less than 20% of poverty.
That is one point that gives you the democratic system.
And we have the moral right to discuss about the importance of democracy.
Our economy.
We work a lot to be very independent in our region.
We have two continental countries and neighbors, Brazil and Argentina.
And they're a bit bigger than you.
Absolutely.
Paraguay, we say it's a small country, but the size of our territory is the same than France or even Spain.
But we are only six and a half million inhabitants.
In our history, we have had two important wars.
The Triple Alliance, when Argentina, Brazil, and Uruguay go to the war against Paraguay.
Paraguay resisted five years.
We lost the 90%.
Of our male population and 60% of our territory.
And Paraguay, when the war end in 1970, doesn't receive written with the institution to help him.
The Paraguay emerged alone.
And that is the reason why we have a very special culture.
The 90% of the Paraguayan people, we speak Warani.
Our currency is Guarani, and our main music is Guarani.
And really, it's very interesting.
We respect our origins.
Secondly, working hard during those years, Paraguay arrived last year to investment grade.
We have a lot of challenge.
But we have the most important resources in the world.
Today, the risk on the world is about food security.
Well, Paraguay, with 6.5 million inhabitants, produces food for 100 million people.
And that means we have a very strong opportunity to develop our potential on food security fighting against.
Secondly, Paraguay has the most important reserve of water, sweet water.
And Paraguay is the country that produces more energy renewable per capita in the world.
That is a very interesting position to develop technology.
We are working on that also.
The average The age of population is 26. The 70% of our population is younger than 50 years old.
I mean, the potential of the country is quite important.
But the challenge that we have is very important on logistics, for example.
We have the resources.
The third biggest flu in the world, after China, United States, and the third is Paraguay.
That's the third largest set of freshwater barges, right?
The rivers, the rivers Paraguay and Paraná, 3,200 kilometers of navigable rivers, and to go up to the La Plata River in Argentina to the seaports.
And we have all our trade through the rivers.
The transportation, our production, the 90% is going through the river.
Also, we have the opportunity to increase our market because we have trade agreements as MERCOSUR, an integration, economic integration system, with Brazil and Argentina and Uruguay and now Bolivia.
It's added.
And looking at other countries like Panama to join us as a country member of MERCOSUR, that is important because we are increasing our market access at the region level.
So you mentioned Panama earlier as, of course, one of the countries.
Panama has been featured recently, of course, right, because the discussion of the Panama Canal and...
You know, some tough exchanges, perhaps, and Panama shifting its policy.
How do you view it?
Well, first of all, there are very interesting discussions between the Panama government and the United States.
The rule of law also is important.
The international rights is important.
And this discussion among two governments that Marco Rubio started...
If you can go visiting Panama, it's a good time to go to resolve the problem that we have before us.
I think always that being Secretary General of OAS can help strongly both governments to arrive to an understanding.
You know, the problem, as articulated by President Trump, was too much Chinese Communist Party control of the Panama Canal.
And I can't help but notice that Paraguay actually has formal relations with Taiwan, one of only 12 countries that does.
And that's kind of fascinating to me.
So explain to me why.
Well, first of all, Paraguay started its relations in 1968. 68 years ago, never we cut the relation with Taiwan.
It's a decision on principles.
We need and we always support Taiwan because they have the democracy.
They have the human rights, rules and protection.
They have the freedom.
They have a very clear rule of law.
I mean, we need to protect this country.
And we feel the same in Taiwan.
We are an island surrounded by land, say our writer, Augusto Roabastos.
And they are an island.
Well, we are not against China.
And we will have...
Diplomatic relation or commercial relation or consular relation with China, but without conditions.
But we will still recognize in Taiwan because of those principles.
And we have a very close relation with Taiwan and it's important to Paraguay to keep this relation.
It's not easy at all.
But it's important to understand and to promote those principles always.
Now, let me see if I understand this right.
I mean, you're putting this very high value on democracy, rule of law, human rights.
In a sense, though, you're saying this is a pragmatic Maintaining those things keeps the whole society.
That's what I hear you telling me.
So there's principle, but it's also a very pragmatic principle.
Is that right?
Absolutely.
It's pragmatic.
Because we need to keep those principles for ourselves.
We need to follow those principles because we need to build a very serious country.
And our strength It's based on those principles, our development.
The challenge for Paraguay is the social inclusion today, to fight against poverty, that we have less than 20%, but it's huge people for us.
And we have to give them the opportunity to create jobs, to foreign investment and national investment also, to develop our country.
To transform production, to give, add value for our production, and to increase.
And how we are dealing with that.
First of all, education.
Education is the first priority for our government.
Healthcare and also security.
Those three issues we are working as a priority in our country.
Then the macroeconomic fundamentals and the tools.
For the economic growth, given the best conditions of fiscal policies.
We have the rule of triple 10, 10% value, 10% on income, and 10% to cooperative.
That means we have the lowest taxation maybe in the world.
Well, and I can't help but notice that both the President and the Finance Minister of Paraguay are economists.
Yes.
Which tells me something.
And I'm an economist, also Minister of Foreign Affairs.
Well, you know, the President, he was former Minister of Finance.
My colleague, the Minister of Finance today is an economist.
And the Minister of Foreign Affairs, myself, I am an economist also.
The development is our challenge always and our priority.
How has your Paraguays relationship with Argentina changed since President Millet became president?
We have a very close relation.
We have a lot of challenges sharing together for Paraguay.
The economic situation of Argentina is quite important because they need to improve the solution on the economic growth that Argentina knows.
The Minister of Foreign Affairs from Argentina, Gerardo Huerten, is also a very close friend of mine.
We are working closely together always.
And we have the same relation with Brazil.
President Lula is a very close friend of President Santiago Peña, as well as Javier Milei, and the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Mauro Vieira, and we have a lot of interest sharing with both countries.
At the regional level, we share the highway of the river Paraguay-Paraná, We share the Mercosur.
We share the dams.
We share the trade exchange.
We share investments.
I mean, we share the markets.
We are working very close with those workers.
Yamandu Orsi, he's a very close friend of us also.
We met the elected president from Uruguay three times.
Discussing about the integration.
He is very close to us also.
And we share the view.
Even if they have a different ideological position from us.
And that means we are very practical.
We don't think about the left or the right.
We are going straight.
I say always precedence at the opening.
Well, and so it's interesting, but...
But you don't compromise your principles either?
Never.
Well, and that's, so that is a, as we say in English, a tough needle to thread, right?
A tough balance to find.
At the right, you are in the corner.
At the left, you are in the corner.
But in the center, both forces look to...
Put yours from their side.
Being in the center gives us the opportunity, first, to protect our principles.
Secondly, to work close from those countries.
Because we are looking at our people's interests protecting, we have the interrelation, knowing interdependence relations with our neighbors.
And really, we respect each government because they were elected for the people decide democratically.
And we have to respect that.
And we are looking always the common denominator for our relations.
And we work on that.
And even if they have...
In the position, for example, the president Santiago Pena and the president Boric from Chile, they have a very close relation and that don't have any relation with ideology.
They have very close relations because they share several points of view together.
And we concentrate our relationship on those common points of view.
And that gives us the opportunity to strengthen our relations.
What about your hopes for how the U.S. in particular, of course, will engage with Paraguay and Latin America?
What is your dream situation?
My dream situation is that Paraguay is the most important ally the United States has in South America.
We share those values with the government of President Trump especially, with the people in the Secretary of State, starting with Marco Rubio, Christopher Landau, Christopher is a very close friend of Paraguay, and all the people working around this Trump government.
And just if I may comment, Christopher Landau, he speaks Guarani, from what I understand.
That is remarkable.
Christopher's father, he was ambassador to Paraguay.
Christopher started his education in Paraguay, and he studied at the International College in Asuncion, and he learned Guarani, and he speaks Guarani.
And I'm very proud of his Guarani, because he speaks very well.
In those days, because here in the hearing process, I can't speak with him.
But before his nomination...
We were talking about his experience in Paraguay, etc.
He is very, very good friend of Paraguay, but we are not looking for friends only.
The most important is that Paraguay matters in the agenda of the United States.
Why?
Because Paraguay is a very important and key partner for the United States.
And so what about the region now, more broadly?
In terms of, you know, what you hope America's role will be?
I think that America abandoned a lot of time Latin America.
In the last year, United States lost a lot of market, a lot of investment, and a lot of opportunities.
I think that that is the time to work close again.
Well, Minister Ruben Ramirez-Lascano, such a pleasure to have had you on.
It's my pleasure, John.
It's a pleasure to be with your audience and hope to see you again here in Washington.
Absolutely.
Thank you all for joining the Foreign Minister of Paraguay, Ruben Ramirez-Loscano and me on this episode of American Thought Leaders.
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