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Angola scheduled CPLP summit for 16-17 July

Angola “officially” scheduled the summit of the Community of Portuguese Speaking Countries (CPLP) for 16 and 17 July in Luanda, where Equatorial Guinea “surprises, in a good way” should be presented, which promised to abolish the death penalty.

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In an interview to Lusa, the Cape Verdean Minister of Foreign Affairs and Defense, Rui Figueiredo Soares, explained that he will host a meeting on 8 May, on the island of São Vicente, with his counterpart in Angola, a country that will assume the presidency of the CPLP after the Summit of Heads of State and Government.

"Officially", the summit date is set and "it will take place on the 16th and 17th of July in Luanda", he explained.

The great banner of the Cape Verdean presidency, the proposal for the mobility of people within the community, the text of which is already closed and approved by the CPLP Council of Ministers, will be one of the main themes of the summit, which will address economic issues, choosing a new executive secretary or holding an economic conference.

At that meeting, Equatorial Guinea will have the opportunity to present the state of play regarding the end of the death penalty, one of the conditions of its adhesion to the organization, in 2014.

"We may have surprises in this regard, in a good sense, regarding the issue of the death penalty. We know the progress that Equatorial Guinea has made in this regard, but I cannot say any more," said Rui Figueiredo Soares.

The country is in the process of legislative approval of a new Penal Code, which provides for the end of the death penalty. "We had the opportunity to speak recently with my colleague from Foreign Affairs of Equatorial Guinea and our Presidents of the Republic have also talked about this. And it is very possible that Equatorial Guinea will bring us surprises in this matter," the cable minister told Lusa. -verdian.

Equatorial Guinea had the death penalty when it joined the CPLP and, since then, "has taken significant steps in this direction". This is an "issue on which we have to exercise a diplomacy of influence", but "also respecting the limits imposed" by the sovereignty of each state, added Rui Soares.

The choice of the date for the summit has to do with the fact that it is intended to coincide with the date on which the CPLP celebrates its 25th anniversary, 17 July, said the minister.

"We are now awaiting the official communication from the Heads of State of the invitation for that date," he said.

However, everything that has been discussed so far on issues to be taken to the summit has been dealt with "essentially at the level of the permanent consultation committee, the ambassadors, at the level of focal points", he admitted.

The conference, made up of the Heads of State and / or Government of all member states, is the highest body of the CPLP and is responsible for defining and guiding the general policy and strategies of the CPLP, adopting the legal instruments necessary for the implementation of the present Statutes, being able, however, to delegate these powers to the Council of Ministers.

According to the CPLP statutes, the meeting of Heads of State and Government meets, ordinarily, every two years. The last, the XII Conference of Heads of State and Government of the CPLP, took place in 2018, in Cape Verde, a country that then assumed the rotating presidency of the organization.

In 2020, Angola, which takes on the rotating presidency in July, having requested the postponement of the summit due to the pandemic, leading to the extension of Cape Verde's mandate.

Equatorial Guinea, a former Spanish colony, became a full member of the CPLP in July 2014, through an "accession roadmap" that included the dissemination of Portuguese as the official language and the abolition of the death penalty, a measure that has not yet been adopted. was ratified by the Ecuadorian-Guinean president, Teodoro Obiang.

Teodoro Obiang Nguema, the African President in power since 1979, and his Government are accused by various civil society organizations of constant human rights violations and persecution of opponents.

Angola, Brazil, Cape Verde, Guinea-Bissau, Equatorial Guinea, Mozambique, Portugal, São Tomé and Príncipe and Timor-Leste are the member states of the CPLP.

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