Peru-U.S.: Agenda for an Ekeko (God of Abundance)

The visits to Lima and Tarapoto by James Steinberg, the number two official of the U.S. State Department, came with various messages. One of them is to keep close the two countries that feel the most friendly toward Washington (Bogotá is the other stop on the tour), in a region where the political left is prominent.

Steinberg’s detour to San Martín was to formally check on the progress of the crop substitution program that his government financed. Here, the message is that his office preoccupies itself with the subject of drugs. The message was affirmed by his announcement of more visits to the coca territory, as the U.S. had been conducting in the ’80s to the ’90s.

Steinberg’s presence also tells us that even if Hillary Clinton will reserve herself for large global scenarios, Latin America will see its importance increase by bringing the dedication of U.S. Deputy Secretary Arturo Valenzuela (who recently visited his homeland of Chile) to Steinberg’s attention.

Although, perhaps the visitor has more controversial things to say: The habitual white lie that Washington is not arming Chile, a note of caution in the face of Chinese expansion and the presence of Iran lurking in the neighborhood.

The Latin American politics of Barack Obama in his first year have not been a hit, which is what some specialized analysts have been saying to him in his own city. Their criticism is not so much for the errors that he has committed, but for missed opportunities, which can be translated as lost time. It is certain that this is also being said in respect to his policies regarding other parts of the world.

An analysis by Peter Hakim for El Universal (Mexico) speaks of Obama being blocked on Latin American regional subjects by the Republicans in Congress and of a Latin America that encounters more and more coincidences and discrepancies involving Washington. He referred to things such as bases in Colombia and Cuba, the Organization of American States, and the solution to the coup in Honduras.

Steinberg took office at the beginning of last year with a particularly tough discourse, proposing that friends and associates of the U.S. in the region require from him a “strong and sustained leadership in the region, as a counterweight to governments like those currently in power in Venezuela and Bolivia.” For better or worse, his true management since then has been characterized by inaction.

However, his declaration in Colombia that took place a few hours ago had the smell of his original firmness: “It is a strategic relationship and a great alliance not only in the cooperation of security against drug-trafficking and armed groups.” Perhaps something more helpful regarding these two topics would be to ease the burden of our crime-infested zones in Peru.