The organizer for Latin America of World Beyond War, Gabriel Aguirre, said that the region is plagued by US military bases, with at least 76 installations. He also highlighted the Monroe Doctrine as a historical pillar of US foreign policy for this geographic area and mentioned how even the head of the US Southern Command, General Laura Richardson, recognized the interest in Latin American natural resources.

Ecuador is one of the few countries without US military bases since the US left the Manta base in 2009, however, the issue has resurfaced with a proposal for constitutional reform and agreements with Washington to facilitate its presence in Ecuador, Aguirre said.

Luis Ángel Saavedra, from the Coalition against the Intervention and US Military Base in the Galapagos, warned about the negative effects of the possible installation of a foreign military base in that archipelago, as the current government intends. He explained that, although it is justified as a supposed strategy against drug trafficking, its real impact would be on the local population.

Cuban ambassador to Ecuador Basilio Gutiérrez addressed the use of economic sanctions and coercive measures as tools of the United States in search of domination, and as an example of this he denounced the economic blockade against Cuba. He also mentioned the Guantánamo naval base, illegally occupied for more than a century by the United States and which has been used as a detention and torture center for prisoners under the pretext of fighting terrorism, and now houses migrants.

Mahfud Bechri, a Sahrawi activist, explained the situation in Western Sahara, where a wall built between 1980 and 1987 divides the territory between the area occupied by Morocco and the liberated territories under the control of the Polisario Front. With a length of 2,720 kilometers, “the wall is an obstacle to peace and the legitimate Sahrawi right to self-determination,” separating families and preventing the Sahrawis from accessing their lands, in addition to being mined with explosives, criticized Bechri.

The director of the Honduran Observatory of Cultures, Carlos Antonio Padilla, recounted how Honduras has been a strategic point for foreign military interventions, and urged Latin American peoples to unite against militarism and the installation of bases in sovereign territories.

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