Tomorrow, Enrique Peña Nieto, the president-elect of Mexico who takes office on December 1, will meet with Stephen Harper in Ottawa.
The President-elect of Mexico writes in the Globe and Mail today, “One of the areas with the largest potential for co-operation between Mexico and Canada is energy production and development. Mexico’s energy sector is about to change. I want to enhance its potential by opening it up to national and foreign private investment. We will not give up Mexico’s ownership over energy resources and we will not privatize our state-run oil company, Petróleos Mexicanos. Nevertheless, we will welcome new technologies, partnerships and investments. Canadian energy companies have developed a profound know-how in difficult-to-extract energy. We can cultivate a closer relationship in this area in order to attain North American energy security, a common goal.”
Perrin Beatty, the president of the Canadian Chamber of Commerce, and Andrés Rozental, Mexico’s former deputy foreign minister, also write in the Globe and Mail today, “Canada and Mexico could each benefit from taking a broader view of North American relations. An enhanced economic partnership among Canada, Mexico and the United States would make North America as productive and competitive as any other major economic area. …In the immediate future, there are opportunities for Canada and Mexico to collaborate on regional and international issues. Both boast large hydrocarbon industries and both have relatively carbon-intensive economies. With Mr. Peña Nieto’s promise to allow foreign investment in the Mexican petroleum sector, Canadian energy firms can look for opportunities in Mexico. Mexican-Canadian co-ordination on some continental issues could help even the playing field. This applies, for example, to pursuing greater alignment in their regulatory regimes.”
Mexicanos Unidos por la Regularización (Mexicans United for Regularization, MUR) will be holding a protest tomorrow (Nov. 28) at 4 pm in front of the Hotel Château Laurier. They will be demanding an end to violence, electoral fraud, the neo-colonial exploitation of natural resources, C-31 and deportations. More at http://www.facebook.com/events/440820299311965/.
Council of Canadians chairperson Maude Barlow was recently in Mexico participating in the Permanent Peoples’ Tribunal study of the impact of major dams on people and the environment. She also spoke in Mexico City on the right to water and visited the Wirikuta, a sacred area threatened by a Canadian mining company. More on Barlow in Mexico at http://canadians.org/blog/?p=18114. Blue Planet Project water campaigner Meera Karunananthan and I were also recently in Mexico with a human rights delegation reporting on the impact of another Canadian mining company on the people of San Jose del Progreso in Oaxaca state. More on that intervention at http://canadians.org/blog/?p=18037, as well as in this CBC News report, http://canadians.org/blog/?p=18049.
