The first session ever of the new Inter-American Network of Legislative Leaders was held in Boca Chica on Saturday. The Network is the creation of the Organization of American States (OAS) and the Washington-based group Inter-American Dialogue (IAD). The OAS-IAD project is designed to promote dialogue, exchange of ideas and experience, and cooperation among key legislators in the Western Hemisphere. The two-day event was held at the Hotel Coral Hamaca Beach. It opened with an official welcome from President Leonel Fernández at 9:00 AM. Fernández spoke of the importance of a strong legislature and stressed the importance of dialogue between the executive and legislative branches and of working together constructively to solve national problems. For his part, OAS Secretary-General César Gavira Trujillo said in his remarks that he was confident that the Dominican President and the political parties could find a way to resolve the present crisis concerning the Central Elections Board (JCE). The Network meeting discussed a number of issues of common interest to Latin American legislators, including drug trafficking and money laundering. The former was declared a threat to democracy, but the group urged that the U.S. find a way to hand over its current "certification" regime (whereby U.S. authorities every year must certify that Latin American countries are working hard enough to fight drugs, or else U.S. trade concessions and aid to the country in question are cut off) to some sort of regional, presumably more impartial, certification body.
