Interview: U.S.-LatAm ties to be reassessed given China's new role: Chile's ex-president

The relationship between the United States and Latin America needs to be reassessed, given China's larger role in today's global affairs, according to Chile's former president Ricardo Lagos.

"Some 25 years since the end of the Cold War, it's time to view the traditional ties between Latin America and the United States in a new light, starting with the emerging global player that is China," Lagos told Xinhua in an interview Tuesday.

In the interview conducted Tuesday evening at the Senate in Chile's capital Santiago, where Lagos, and former Uruguayan foreign minister and former president of the Inter-American Development Bank Enrique Iglesias, unveiled their book "Latin America, China and the United States: Latin American views on international relations in the 21st century."

The book, said Lagos, "helps to understand how to have a suitable relationship with China and with the United States, and to understand what is happening in those countries."

Currently, he noted, China's economic growing pains are causing turbulence in its domestic markets. At the same time, its national currency has been granted the reserve status by the International Monetary Fund.

China is undergoing an "economic transition," according to Lagos. But more importantly, from a geopolitical perspective, it is "taking giant steps on the global stage," he said.

In January 2015, for example, Chinese President Xi Jinping played host to the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC), drawing regional leaders and foreign ministers to Beijing, said Lagos.

The United States has also made strides in its ties with the region, he said, with U.S. President Barack Obama making history by shaking hands with his Cuban counterpart Raul Castro at the Summit of the Americas in Panama.

"So, a triangular reality is emerging with force, from our point of view, between Latin America and the Caribbean and the United States, and China," said Lagos.

"Now we are in the presence of this new reality," said Lagos, describing it as a "radical change in international relations" akin to the "Treaty of Westphalia, which established the European borders, and to the end of the Cold War."

"No one can solve the great problems of the world alone," he added.

Fortunately, there are signs of cooperation, according to Lagos. He noted it was "the understanding between President Xi and President Obama" that helped break the deadlock at the climate talks in Paris late last year.

"The challenge for Latin America now" is to adapt to this new multilateral world order, "because we were accustomed to an order where the predominance of Spain passed to France, then from France to England, and then from England to the United States,"said Lagos.

Meanwhile, Latin America is under pressure to tackle the challenges of regional integration in this new world order, said Lagos.

"From here on, international relations will be between countries or between continents that can reach a consensus to speak with a single voice," Lagos said.

"If we do that well, perhaps as Latin Americans we can speak with a single voice that can be better heard in the world," Lagos added. Endi