El Salvador: Activists mark 11 years since defeat of FTAA deal and creation of ALBA

Around 50 protesters celebrated the 11th anniversary of Latin American countries' rejection of the US-led Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA) agreement and the creation of the Bolivarian Alliance for the Peoples of Our America (ALBA) by Venezuelan leader Hugo Chavez, in front of the US embassy in San Salvador, Friday.
Miguel Escobar of the National Agrarian Front, said, "Right now the popular social movements of El Salvador are rallying to rejoice that eleven years ago we annihilated the ALCA [Free Trade Area of the Americas], and the birth of ALBA [Bolivarian Alternative for the Americas], which was a present left by our commander Hugo Chavez. We are also aware that the north-American empire is currently seeking to intensify its mechanisms of invasions against our people."
Wilfredo Berríos of the Salvadoran Union Front, said, "That is why today we announce and show solidarity with all the progressive Latin American countries including the case of Venezuela, which is receiving a blow from the embassy of the United States, but that somehow the population, the people, clearly have taken to the streets and prevented the coup there in Venezuela."
The FTAA trade agreement was initially planned to expand NAFTA (North American Free Trade Agreement) to include 31 additional nations. The ALBA economic union was founded by the governments of Cuba and Venezuela and designed to counter US influence in the follow up to a final and unsuccessful FTAA summit in Mar del Plata, in November 2005.