Argentina says it wants to re engage with the world, especially through its presidency of the g20. It wants better ties with washington after many years of a poor relationship. My guest is argentinas foreign ministerjorge faurie. Just seven months into the job, what is his assessment of ties with the Trump Administration which, after all, has been unsettling its neighbours in latin america. Foreign ministerjorge faurie, welcome to hardtalk. Thank you very much for inviting me. Two years ago when president macri took office he said he wanted to improve relations with the world and argentinas neighbours. Can you encapsulate for us what that means . We are trying to reopen argentina to the world. We describe it as an intelligent insertion. We are trying to have good relations with everybody, particularly with our neighbours. We are trying to see what we can do with each one independent of the ideological position that they have. All right. The big one, of course, is the United States, and president macri said he wanted to chart a new course with washington because after 1a years and the presidency of de kirchner and then his wife cristina, the relations between argentina and the United States have been extremely poor. Are they good now . Well, we have done a lot of work together, both countries, and we have improved a lot in our political dialogue. We are in a permanent dialogue with the United States on differenc issues. We are having good economic relations. In a few days we will receive secretary of state rex tillerson. We have had the visit of the Vice President of the United States. We have a dialogue which is a constructive one, recognising the differences that we have. A constructive dialogue with the United States, ata time when you have donald trump in the white house, saying he wants to build a wall to keep the mexicans out. A former centrist colombian president said that this is a wall that will separate us Latin Americans from the United States, because if you affect mexico, you affect latin america. So you, argentina, want to hug him, and he wants to keep the region at arms length. We have good relations with all the countries. The wall is not in place. So we are discussing the bilateral relations of argentina, which are in terms of dialogue and politics, but also importantly for us, dialogue for business. What we can sell to the United States, what the United States want to sell to us. This is an important market. I will come to economics in a moment but im just saying that you say you want to have a warm relationship with the United States. I did not say that. You do not want warm ties with the United States . You want a cold relationship . Neither. We want to have a constructive relationship from all countries, and we learn from each one what we can do. I think we have established, president macri has established a dialogue with President Trump that is good, and it allows us to call whenever we need to say we have a problem that we need to solve. Let me just give you one problematic thing between latin america, south america, Central America and washington, sometimes, is the use of President Trumps colourful language. For example, he called he did not want migrants from countries like el salvador and haiti, saying that they are s hole countries. The president of el salvador then said that he demands respect for the dignity of el salvadors noble and courageous people. That was offensive language, wasnt it, about a country in your region . We share with all the latin american countries a historical relation. We are a coutry which is open to migrants, and we respect the entity of each country, and the characteristic of each. It was offensive language, wasnt it . It is language which is not good for dialogue. You said something interesting, because you said we are open to immigration from countries in latin america. But that is not quite the case because in 2017, president macris government, your government, curbed immigration to argentina from poorer countries in latin america. He said his first concern was caring for argentines, caring for ourselves. Where is your latin american solidarity . We have in our country, with immigration from bolivia, uruguay and paraguay, peru and chile, now we have plenty of people coming in after the situation in venezuela. We are a country that after 1942 has open frontiers. So what did he mean, then . The president was referring to us not doing any military control, because we have an open border, and we do not restrict entrance for anyone from those countries. We just wanted to have a register of who is coming and who is going. It meant that newcomers from poorer countries in latin america were not so welcome. Not against poor people, because in latin america you have poor people in all countries, including argentina. It is not against poor people, we just want to know who is coming and where they are from. It did provoke them reaction in the region. The president of bolivia said that brothers, latin american president s, we cannot follow the immigration policies of the north. I mean, it sounds like. I dont know if he was addressing it to somewhere else. He may not have wanted to say but there is concern that he may try to follow trumps america tirst policy. Bolivians working and living in argentina and they are a very constructive part of our society. And the same for the peruvians, the same for the paraguayans. There are neighbourhoods in different areas of big cities in argentina which are bolivian or pa raguaya na, because we are all descended from immigrants. But thats the point i wanted to make, because this triggered a debate in the country. A radio show. Some people wanted to make an issue of something which is not. I know which radio you are referring to. The radio show host, raoul coleman, said that the government wants to dilute the fact that a large share of us are children or grandchildren of immigrants, including president macri himself, the son of an italian immigrant. They define argentineans as sons of the boats. We are all descended from a boat here in argentina. We have no particular issue of race, religion or whatever to make a difference. Migrants happen all the time in argentina because we are migrants ourselves. You accept then that when president macri said this, it triggered a debate that created concern that you may be following Donald Trumps rhetoric. Not that much. Some elements of the press, some radio comments political reasons but it was not a societal issue. You want a constructive dialogue with the United States. Andras oppenheimer, a latin american editor of the miami herald, he wrote in december that so far the Trump Administration has only pursued a negative agenda towards the region, opposing trade, immigration and environmental agreements and cutting foreign aid without offering any constructive plans to improve hemispheric ties. It sounds you are extending the hand but it is not being reciprocated. I can speak about myself, for my own situation and affairs, as they say, translating from spanish. We have a constructive dialogue in terms of trade. We have investment from the american companies. We have been reinstated in the generalised system of preferences, which annuls certain commercial barriers. Our dialogue with the United States is good. Really . But hasnt the United States imposed tariffs on argentine biodiesel . But also europe. We look to europe in a second. Trade tariffs on argentine bio diesel . This is something that happens with Different Countries who discuss how to construct the price of our bio diesel. We, the eu, they did the sale. We went to a panel in the wto and we won the panel. Now the americans are doing this because there are people in the us who are still affected. We say we are not truly affecting, because you are importing from many other countries, too. Lets discuss this. This does not mean that the relationship is good or bad. Its a commercial issue. But you just said that we want to open up trade. And we are opening. Yet here you have the United States imposing tariffs. We are sending food, lemons, we are sending grain, pork, we are sending Different Things to the United States. We have our discussion concerning bio diesel. That is all. President mauricio macri, before assuming the president ship was mayor of buenos aires, and also a former business associate of donald trump. Isnt that a conflict of interest . Between him and his ties with donald trump . Many years ago they thought about building something together in new york. It did not happen at all. Is that all . I can tell you what the report say. Press reports say that when president macri phoned donald trump to congratulate him on becoming president , Donald Trumps daughter ivanka was also on the phone, though she did not have security clearance, number one. And donald trump asked president macri to approve construction of a 100 million trump tower in buenos aires. I think that that is very far fetched from the press you are reading. So that is not true. Both leaders denied this assertion. But can you tell us what happened, then . President macri called him to congratulate him on his election and he remembered him very well. They have been in touch sometimes in these 20 years, and thats it. I know you, you know me, that is good. It is good to have someone that i know sitting in the white 0ffice. So you dont think it will create a conflict of interest . No, not at all. Another aspect of your Foreign Policy in argentina is that you say you want to promote human rights and democracy in the region, to kind of bring an ethical dimension to your Foreign Policy. We do promote human rights. And this is a long standing position of argentina after the ending of the military dictatorship. So this has been a permanent dimension of all Foreign Policy of all governments in argentina, including mine. You have an ethical dimensional to Foreign Policy but when it comes to venezuela and what is going on there and the problems that the president there is having and the protests and so on and so forth. Are you not taking too tough a line about what to do on argentina . What line do you take when you are deprived of your liberty . The possiblity of practicing your ideals of your possibility of being elected to office, following your ideals, of having Political Rights . Which will be the situation of liberty if you cannot feed yourself, or have access to medicine, if your economy is collapsing and no one is taking care of you . What is your venezuelan policy then . Would you like to see a regime change . We want elections to have. Fair elections, that should be done the sooner, the better. But they must be prepared. A Fair Election means that you have the government who can not control the Electoral College that will do the elections because if not, it certainly will be rigged elections. This is something that not only argentina but all of the members of the group of lima, we are promoting this. We want venezuelan to return to democracy. And democracy as all countries recognise it. So you want regime change . We cant say we want this or that. The elections must be free and so far the last election, the municipal ones, the state elections and the one now announced to come later on, they are not clear elections. It is not democratic system. In november last year, president macri said that i think we should go to a full embargo. Your countrys position is you want a full embargo on venezuela. It is quite difficult to change the situation in terms of having a clear election if the government still receives funds coming from oil that mostly sells in the us. That is the market. If you want to see that the government pursues a more democratic line, you must emphasise this. Tell the us to no longer take oil from venezuela . Different countries have discussed this with the us and then came problems that led them to resume oil from venezuela. Because the United States does not want to go that far, in fact, by saying. They have taken measures of their own path, they are sizing all the assets that the leader has. Youve just said theres so much hardship in venezuela, people do not have enough to eat and so on, 95 of venezuelas export revenue comes from the oil company, the state owned oil company. Yes, whenever we say. Its obvious then that whats going to happen to the country, what happens when you cut off that revenue. Embargoes are not always an effective measure. We want to call the attention to a change that has to be done for venezuela to become more democratic. This is what would happen if there was a full embargo. Local ngos in venezuela are opposed to such a move. I tell you what an economist from torino capital, called francisco rodriguez, says, cutting off the venezuelan governments access to dollars would leave the economy without the hard currency needed to pay for imports of food and medicine, starving the venezuelan economy of its foreign currency earnings. It risks turning the countrys current humanitarian crisis into a full blown humanitarian catastrophe. The embargo is not going on. If it did happen that is what would happen. The venezuelans are already in a catastrophe. They cannot feed themselves, they do not have food. But you would make it worse. Your policy of a full us embargo on oil would make it worse. That is what people are saying. Actually, the situation today, it is the one you are describing. Without even having even an embargo. We have to look at the economic situation. Wouldnt the embargo make it worse . We should discuss that when it comes. But youve already president decided, because macri has said i want a full embargo. We are discussing with the countries in the area what to do with venezuela, in terms of how to help them come back to democracy. Well, i tell you. Cynthia arnson, whos a latin american expert from the Woodrow Wilson centre in washington says, look, there is a deep concern, she says, about the situation of venezuela and a deep dialogue, as you say, about what to do, but there is also nobody calling for that tough a line. Generally, latin america is opposed to any us unilateral action. Yes. We have been discussing with all the members of the group of lima, what measures to have. These measures always refer to the possibility of doing, maybe, something in the united nations, in 0as. Unfortunately 0as is paralysed. Because politically it is paralysed. Thats the organisation of american states. By venezuela. In the united nations, yet they are considering if it is a social or humanitarian crisis in venezuela. So the countries who are members of the group of lima would like to have measures and a show of goodwill from venezuela in the term to return to a more open society, to free all political prisoners, to respect human rights and give the population the population to receive fruit and medicine, not related to their ideological position in the venezuelan society. You want to put pressure on the government, in whatever way, to bring that about. We find different ways to put the venezuelans in attention about what we are doing. We dont put pressure actually to the governments, each country it is different. Do you want sanctions . I mean, we did have sanctions in terms of mercosur. We said, till. Thats a local regional grouping. Mercosur. Of which venezuela was a part. We said until you return to democracy youre no longer a member of the group. You are suspended. That is a kind of sanction. There are other sanctions, ones the European Union has taken. Taking the assets of the political leaders. Different kind of sanctions. That is what we are moving around. Here is argentina now, you have taken over, in the last month or so, the chairmanship of the g20 and you say that you want to focus on three things in your presidency, which is infrastructure, social inclusion, and food security. Just give us an idea of how you are going to go about achieving this in setting up a dialogue amongst the g20. The g20 is a dialogue between all the country members who will decide what we can do to improve this. Infrastructure is not only coming from the decision of argentina, it is we have been discussing in g20, during the german presidency too. We will highlight the possibilities of making a fund to finance the infrastructure needs in Different Countries which are members. Not only the members, but some other regions too. In terms of social inclusion, we are very much worried about the impact of the technological revolution that is affecting the Labour Market which is causing some types of work to disappear. And this disappearance means that the people need to re skill, to be adaptive to the new possibilities of work. And this comes into education. Within your grouping of countries in latin america, drugs is always a big issue, drugs trafficking, and theres a growing regional consensus that the war on drugs has failed. It seems that the macri government is adopting a hardline approach which is counter productive, some people say. No, why would it be counter productive to fight drugs . This is affecting our youth, oursociety, undermining the institutional structure of any countries where drug has been successful. Look at the presence of Different Countries in the area. We want to avoid that. We have to have a very clear stance against drugs as we have against terrorism, because there is a connection also between the business of drugs with terrorism. The criticism is this, i give you an example of what has been said, marcelo bergman, whos a security expert, says the macri government is treating drugs mainly as a security issue, there is no energy devoted to programmes to reducing demand or treating addicts. This is that is the part that is missing, he says. You are taking it as a very tough police. We have, many years, different governments, a very clear position in trying to help the ones which have come to the consumption. Now we had to Pay Attention to the Security Issues that brings the drug business. The other plans are still going on. So far all have been developed over many years. This is a concern to which argentinian society pays a lot of attention. What we are now paying attention is something the previous government has not paid attention to which is the control of the borders concerning the people who bring in drugs. So another aspect of the challenges for your government is the fact that two years ago when this Coalition Government came to power, the economy was in a very bad state, heavily indebted, people were finding it a real struggle, the cost of living was very high. Inflation was rampant. Absolutely. The centrist pro market government comes in, but expectations are high and youve got to deliver. Yes. President macris party does not have a majority in parliament, so how easy, how difficult is going to be for him try to get his pro market reforms through . That makes it much more worthwhile all the changes and the reforms that president macri and his government are doing just to improve our economical situation. The first thing we had to improve was now macroeconomics. Inflation was rampant. Deficit was absolutely high. Wasteful subsidies. Cut off from international credit. Cut off. Slowly, during the first year, we paid our indebtors outside, we tried to put in order the deficit, we are curtailing our deficit. We are now trying to achieve this year 3. 2 of our deficit in the budget. These are important measures taken. And the people are also going along with him. The elections that took place last 0ctober were a reaffirmation of the actions taken by the government of president macri. There were some local elections. The mid term. Mid term elections. The mid term elections in argentina marks where the people want the government to go. I mustjust ask you this, an interesting fact about argentina and president macri himself as talked about, he says he wants argentina on the couch to deal with its hangups, to make it normal, he says. And he admits he has been to a psychoanalyst himself. And your country is famous for having more psychologists per capita than any other country in the world. We share this condition with new york. New york as a city. You have the accolade as a country. What is it about the argentine psyche . We discuss everything about psychology. Whenever we discuss anything of our own lives we turn immediately to psychology. But we have to be normal in the sense of do whatever the other countries are doing. That is the reason we apply to become members of the 0ecd, because there are certain solutions, certain proposals on how to labour, how to control inflation, how to move capital that are already proved by the world. So what is the point of going and trying to invent something, if we can go as the normal people go. As we say, we are not going to invent bread, nor the scissors and we use the bicycle as everybody does. That is a normal country. Which is a psychological approach to life because you have to be more common sense. Foreign ministerjorge faurie, thank you very much. Thank you for having me here. Thank you. Well, the weather over the weekend was pretty mixed, wasnt it . At least we ended on a mostly sunny note, that is across the majority of the country on sunday. Now its turning colder. Cold enough for some snow this week. Some of us will get a covering over the next couple of days. You might even have some snow lying in your area already. Thats most likely across south eastern areas, east anglia and into lincolnshire. Wintry showers blowing off the north sea over the last few hours. Might be a covering just in time for the rush hour, particularly in kent and sussex, maybe essex and possibly even the Greater London area as well. These areas were talking about. That north easterly wind bringing cold air and wintry showers. The further west you are the brighter it will be. It will be cold. Temperatures in towns and cities around freezing or below. Here are the wintry showers getting into kent and sussex, parts of east anglia. One or two flakes of snow likely into the north east of england as well. The rest of the country, northern ireland, the rest of england, scotland, waking to frosty weather but mostly bright if not sunny weather. So, lets see whats happening during the course of monday. The best of the weather will be across western areas, most of the sunshine, beautiful for the lowlands of scotland, around the lake district, into wales, the south west as well, but partly cloudy skies across central and eastern areas, and from time to time well continue to have those wintry showers. But there wont be too many of them. How about the rest of europe . Its pretty cold for many of the major centres across parts of western europe. Look at madrid three celsius. Very chilly. Some of the cold air has dug into africa, into morocco and also the ca nary islands. So chilly weather across many western parts of europe. Back home, look at this, monday night into tuesday, a weather front rising to that cold air. There will be a period of snow across some of these western areas, settling across the hills for sure. Ten centimetres is possible. Even the towns and cities could have a covering during early tuesday. By the time that weather front reaches the south east, the snow should have snowed itself out. Tuesday night into wednesday, we are in between weather systems here. There will be a window of fine weather. Sunshine around on wednesday. It looks as though things will cloud over once again by the time we get to thursday with outbreaks of rain and possibly turning milderjust for the day. Overall this week it will stay cold with widespread frosts at night where the skies clear, and from time to time well have some snow. This is the briefing, im sally bundock. Our top story a crucial moment for south africa. President jacob zuma is still clinging to power, but for how much longer . Protesters gather en masse in the greek capital, asking the government not to back down in a dispute over the naming of its northern neighbour. And a tense final, but the underdogs have it. The Philadelphia Eagles beat new England Patriots to claim the 52nd super bowl in minnesota. A break from tradition. 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