Bachelet-led panel urges Latin America not to choose sides in US-China rivalry

Latin American countries should resist pressure to choose between the United States and China and use their vast reserves of lithium, copper and other strategic resources to strengthen their negotiating power, according to a high-level commission co-chaired by former Chilean president Michelle Bachelet and former Colombian president Ivan Duque.

But the commission acknowledges that the region’s room for manoeuvre is sharply constrained in security, technology and critical infrastructure, areas in which Washington remains dominant and has sought to curb Beijing’s growing influence.

The report, released on Tuesday by the UN Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean, argues that countries can work with different partners on different issues – maintaining security relationships with Washington while diversifying trade and investment towards China and other economies.

Presenting the report in Santiago, Duque said Latin America needed “a geopolitical vision of our own, not dictated to us”, arguing that countries should not become trapped in fixed alignments or automatically take sides between rival powers.

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