Washington mulls final invite list for Americas summit -U.S. officials

MEXICO CITY, June 1 (Reuters) – The US continues to be hammering out a closing visitor checklist forward of subsequent week’s Summit of the Americas in Los Angeles, senior U.S. officers stated on Wednesday, after weeks of rigidity round a number of international locations anticipated to be excluded.

Summit preparations have been clouded by the specter of an embarrassing boycott by some regional leaders, together with Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, if Cuba, Venezuela and Nicaragua will not be invited.

“We nonetheless have some closing issues, however we are going to, I believe, inform individuals publicly quickly,” White Home Latin America adviser Juan Gonzalez stated in a name with reporters.

Lopez Obrador, who obtained an invite final week, has but to say whether or not he’ll attend.

Gonzalez stated President Joe Biden’s administration has been in talks with Mexico over Lopez Obrador’s insistence that Cuba attend the summit.

U.S. officers are contemplating inviting a lower-ranking Cuban consultant in an effort to mollify Lopez Obrador and different leaders, in keeping with two sources in Washington.

“(Biden) very personally desires the president of Mexico there,” Gonzalez added.

Even when Lopez Obrador doesn’t attend, Washington plans to keep up cooperation with Mexico and current a regional migration plan on the summit, he stated.

The gathering goals to convey collectively nations migrants depart from and move via in addition to vacation spot international locations to point out that “the migration problem will not be one that’s on the U.S. border,” Gonzalez stated.

Brian Nichols, U.S. Assistant Secretary of State, stated the “shared method” may embody making certain documentation, public companies, moral job recruitment and pathways for authorized migration in international locations that host migrants.

The summit will happen in the USA for the primary time since 1994. Washington has stated it solely wished leaders of administrations that respect democracy to attend, and that the leftist governments of Venezuela and Nicaragua wouldn’t be invited.

Reporting by Daina Beth Solomon in Mexico Metropolis and Matt Spetalnick in Washington; further reporting by Katharine Jackson; Modifying by Invoice Berkrot

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