G77+China Summit in Cuba Calls for New Order

The meeting comes at a time of growing frustration with the Western-led world order amid growing differences over Russia's war in Ukraine, the fight against climate change and the global economic system.

“After all this time the Northern Hemisphere has organized the world according to its interests, now the Southern Hemisphere must change the rules of the game,” Cuban President Miguel Diaz-Canel said at the opening of the Summit.

G77 China Summit in Cuba Calls for New Global Order Figure 1 — Former Cuban President Raul Castro (center), Cuban President Miguel Diaz-Canel (right) and UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres attend the G77+China summit in Cuba. Photo: AFP/YAMIL LAGE

Mr. Diaz-Canel said that developing countries are the main victims of a “multidimensional crisis” in the world today, from “unfair and abusive trade” to global warming.

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres will join about 30 heads of state and government from Africa, Asia and Latin America at the two-day summit in Havana.

Opening the meeting, he called for a world "more representative and responsive to the needs of developing economies", stressing that these countries were "caught in a web of global crises".

According to the group's website, the bloc was founded by 77 countries in the Southern Hemisphere in 1964 “to connect and promote their common economic interests and enhance their common negotiating capacity.”

Today it has 134 members, with China listed on its website although the Asian giant says it is not a full member. Cuba assumed the rotating presidency in January.

Latin American leaders such as Venezuela's Nicolas Maduro, Colombia's Gustavo Petro and Argentina's Alberto Fernandez were present at the summit, along with Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas, Angola's Joao Lourenco and Mozambique President Filipe Nyusi.

The meeting will conclude on Saturday with a statement emphasizing “the right to development within an increasingly exclusive, unfair, unjust and predatory international order,” host Cuba’s Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez told reporters on Wednesday.

He said the draft closing statement highlighted the many obstacles facing developing countries and included "a call for a new world economic order".

Ahead of the meeting in Havana, Mr Guterres said “the diversity of these summits reflects the increasingly multipolarity of our world”.

Mai Van (according to AFP, CNA)

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