June 18, 2018

Academic session in charge of Gustavo Zlauvinen, Deputy Secretary of Foreign Policy of the Foreign Affairs Ministry, moderated by Juan Félix Marteau and organized by the CARI Organized Transnational Criminality Committee

Written by Matthias Garcia de Cruz

Versión en español

After he had been presented, the Deputy Secretary started his exposé about the main positions of the Argentinian policy in regards of transnational criminality. Foreign Policy must be defined by three aspects: to be realistic and pragmatic, to be institutionalist and to be deeply cooperative, said Zlauvinen. On the basis of those three characteristics the deputy Secretary presented his exposé.

It is demanded by the circumstances, said the speaker about the necessity of being realistic and pragmatic. Old challenges, and new ones, both, very different, exist, he claimed. He outlined his point by the example of the problematic relation between drugs and political violence. Nevertheless he mooted that organized crime and terrorism can be seen as two activities completely different. Transnational crimes are illegal commercial activities which objective are the pursuit of economic benefit with goods or service which are prohibited, the speaker said. Furthermore he defined terrorism as a violent and illegitimate political practice which objective is to cause terror in a society using different types of attacks. These illegals activities can be thought as separated activities that nourish each other: Narco-dollars are used to finance political violence while this last one can generate better conditions for drug traffic.

So according to the speaker these mutually nourishing activities can get to the point where they overcome the State´s possibility of response and generate a life threatening situation for people and civil society. In this way the Argentinian foreign policy looks like realistic and pragmatic because on the basis of a well-known analysis of the international situation, and of our own and hurtful experience in matter of terrorism we want to strengthen the state, because it is for us the better way to give peace and security to the citizen of our country.

After that the deputy minister referred to the signification of having an institutionalist foreign policy. For that matter, because we actively participate in the construction and support of an international order based on international law, he considered that Argentinian foreign policy contain that notion. In terms of terrorism he added that Argentina considers multilateral forums, regional and hemispherical organisms as the better places to have an active action in purpose of stopping terrorism and to coordinate the fight against it thanks to an active cooperation between states. Furthermore he said that fighting against terrorism requires cooperation juridically correct, based on the maximum respect for international law and to be organic and permanent. Moreover the different postures of Argentina in some internationals organization and specifically in the UN Security Council were analyzed by the speaker. He referred one more time to drug trafficking, which was in his opinion needing a full cooperation with the allies of Argentina, briefly he explained the organized criminality situation in Argentina and what measures were taken by the government to fight against.

In the end, he referred to the foreign policy as a deeply cooperative system pointing out that it is cooperative in the international and interdepartmental. Questions like organized crime and terrorism must force everyone to cooperate and no differences should exist. In that way, the Argentinian Foreign Affairs Ministry puts forward cooperation between national and international level working with national organizations and promoting a global cooperation, he claimed. He presented how the Argentinian Foreign Affairs Ministry was reorganized.

To end with his presentation, Zlauvinen refereed to four concrete actions of foreign policy that are a clear example of permanent cooperation between the Argentinian Foreign Affairs Ministry and other areas of the government. The two first took place with France and Paraguay, the third was an example of a joint operation with the Justice Department during the organization of the GAFI, and the last one was the participation of the Foreign Affairs Ministry in two meeting dealing with terrorism at the UN.

Zlauvinen concluded his presentation saying that the Foreign Affairs Ministry has an intense agenda to strengthen the national capacity to give peace and security to the Argentinian people.

Gustavo ZlauvinenDeputy Secretary of Foreign Policy of the Foreign Affairs Ministry. Graduated in Foreign Affairs in the Universidad Nacional de Rosario, and graduated of the Instituto del Servicio Exterior de la Nación. He was the Director of the International organization for the Argentinian Foreign Affairs Ministry, Buenos Aires (2014-2016). Director and executive secretary Autoridad Nacional para la Convención contra las Armas Químicas (ANCAQ), Buenos Aires (2010-2014),Permanent Representative of the OIEA in the UN /2001-2009). He had other significant Jobs such as President of the Working Group of Terrorism with massive destruction weapons in the UN (Nueva York, 2005-2009)