The Global Foundation for Democracy and Development (FUNGLODE) invited ACP Legal for a lecture untitled “Bi-regional relations, European Union-Latin America & the Caribbean, Prospects and Opportunities” by PhD. Benita Ferrero-Waldner, President of the Foundation European Union - Latin America and the Caribbean (EU-LAC Foundation).

Ms. Ferrero-Waldner is a Doctor of Law from the Paris-Lodron-University of Salzburg (PLUS, Austria) and Honorary Doctor of the Lebanese American University (Beirut). She has held several diplomatic and public positions to become Secretary of State and Minister of Foreign Affairs of Austria. In 2000 she was President of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE). In January 2004, Ms. Ferrero-Waldner was candidate for the presidency of Austria. Later that same year she became European Commissioner for Austria occupying the portfolio of Foreign Affairs and European Neighbourhood Policy and later became Commissioner of Commerce, a position she held until February 2010.

Currently, Ms. Benita Ferrero-Waldner is the President of the EU-LAC Foundation. This institution, based in Hamburg, Germany, is composed of the governments of Latin America, the Caribbean & the European Union countries next to their institutions. Its goal is to put in constant relation the nongovernmental sectors in Europe, Latin America & the Caribbean and to link their actions with the agenda that governments develop in both regions, thus strengthening the partnership between them.

FUNGLODE, foundation of the former Dominican President Leonel Fernandez, has been designated as a strategic partner of the Foundation, and therefore has been chosen by the governments of the European Union, Latin America & the Caribbean to represent the region in conjunction with the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC), who is also a privileged partner of the EU-LAC Foundation.

In his lecture, Ms. Ferrero-Waldner analyzed the evolution of regional relations between the European Union, Latin America and the Caribbean, with the purpose of presenting both perspectives of these relations in an international context of global crisis, as the numerous remaining opportunities to be explored.

The activity took place in the auditorium of FUNGLODE, in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, Wednesday, October 10, 2012 and will continue on October 11 with three panels entitled “Evolution of regional relations”, “the Caribbean within the EU-ALC relation” and “Cooperation in education”.