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http://sankei.jp.msn.com/world/america/071023/amr0710232158009-n1.htm
米、カナダ、メキシコが統合へ？ 保守派懸念の北米連合構想
2007.10.23 21:58
【ワシントン＝ＵＳＡ ＴＯＤＡＹ（マイク・マッドン）】米国、カナダ、メキシコが統合し、欧州連合（ＥＵ）のような北米連合となる構想が政府間で話し合われているのではないか、と保守派の活動家が懸念を深めている。
背景には３国政府が頻繁に安全保障や通商問題で会議を開き、その内容が公表されていないことがある。政府はいずれも「統合の構想はない」と否定しているが、「安全保障と繁栄のための協力関係（ＳＳＰ）」と呼ばれる秘密会合が憶測や批判を生んでいるようだ。
保守派活動家のジェローム・コルシさんは「連合構想を裏付ける多くの証拠がある。私がそれらを挙げると陰謀家と決めつけるだろう」という。
カルロス・グティエレス米商務長官は「根も葉もないことだ。全くのミスリーディングであり、うそである。３国間協議はより効率的、生産的な関係を検討しているだけで、主権にかかわるものでは決してない」と明確に否定する。
人口４億４０００万人、ユーロならぬ「アメロ」が共通通貨として通用し、物や人が自由に域内を動くことになるという保守派の不安は今のところ杞（き）憂（ゆう）にすぎないようだ。
(c) 2007, USA TODAY International. Distributed by Tribune Media Services International.
関連ニュースConservative activists fear North American merger
http://sankei.jp.msn.com/usatoday/071023/usa0710232152004-n1.htm
Conservative activists fear North American merger
2007.10.23 21:52
Someday soon, you'll be keeping ameros in your wallet, not dollars. The goods they buy will zip freely from Mexico to Canada on an enormous new road. And the United States will merge with its neighbors into a massive North American Union that reigns over more than 440 million people.
Or at least, that's the vision being raised by a small but vocal group of bloggers, activists and border security hardliners.
As the U.S. has increased efforts to cooperate with Canada and Mexico on security and trade - and as the Bush administration has pushed immigration reforms that are extremely unpopular with many conservatives - opponents of such moves have become more and more convinced that North America is heading toward a merger.
Though all three governments strongly deny any such plan, a series of private meetings and a sweeping effort to rewrite regulations in all three countries - known as the "Security and Prosperity Partnership" - has emerged as a lightning rod for speculation, criticism and fear.
The goal of the initiative is to ensure that the three countries work together to keep out weapons and terrorists from outside North America, while making it easier for goods, services and legal immigrants to move among the three nations. Business groups and advocates of free trade have pushed for even more cooperation.
But pointing with suspicion to the meetings, the dollar's recent decline in value, increasing illegal immigration and attempts to expand free trade areas in the Western hemisphere, critics say the partnership is just the first step in a much broader attempt to build a "North American Union" modeled after the political and economic integration the European Union built.
"There's too much evidence, you've got too many things happening," said Jerome Corsi, a conservative activist and author of "The Late Great U.S.A.," a book that advances alarming interpretations of the U.S.-Canada-Mexico meetings. "I predicted about a dozen things that are happening (in the global economy), and they say I'm the conspiracy theorist?"
To officials involved in the meetings, which started in 2005, the idea that the partnership will infringe on individual countries' sovereignty is completely misguided.
"I can tell you that that is categorically wrong, it is misleading, it is false, and that type of information, it just creates tension when it shouldn't, because it's not true," Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez said. "We want to do things that are common sense through regulations that will make our three countries more efficient and more productive, but this has nothing to do with sovereignty."
While theories about a North American merger may sound far-fetched, they are rooted in actual negotiations and working groups that all three counties say are important.
Initiatives the SPP has pursued include increasing cooperation between public health labs in each nation; writing similar regulations for industries ranging from medical devices to recreational boating, so companies operating in all three countries don't have different standards to follow; and pursuing policies at border crossing points that ease entry and exit.
Business organizations that seek increased cooperation among the countries have praised the SPP's work, as have some economists and analysts who favor free trade.
"One of the realties of our country is that we live in a global economy," said Maria Luisa O'Connell, president of the Border Trade Alliance, a group that pushes for more integration and cooperation among the three nations. "From a security perspective, from an economic perspective, we cannot afford not to work together with Canada and Mexico."
Some of the claims made by critics of the SPP about plans for a merger appear to be somewhat exaggerated.
- No treaty has been signed or proposed to formalize the relationship, and none of the governments involved has called for integration like the European Union, which issues common currency and passports for citizens of any member nation.
- Though the U.S. dollar is now roughly as valuable as the Canadian dollar after decades of trading at higher prices, both currencies are still worth much more than the Mexican peso. All three nations say they have no plans to set up an "amero" or do away with their own money.
- Critics cite plans for a "superhighway" from the U.S.-Mexico border to the U.S.-Canada border - but the highway already exists, as Interstate 35. Trade supporters hope to route more goods there by building "land ports" along the way to ease commerce.
Still, critics see the meetings as dangerous.
"We just wonder if they're going to let us keep the flag, said William Gheen, executive director of Americans for Legal Immigration PAC, a group that advocates tougher border security and immigration enforcement. "It's very real. It may be conspiracy, but it's no theory."
Critics fault the governments for closing meetings to the public and the media. Only government and corporate officials have been involved in most of the sessions.
The meetings have attracted some attention from Congress. Conservative Rep. Virgil Goode, R-Va., introduced a nonbinding resolution opposing a North American Union in January, and 39 co-sponsors have signed on.
Conservative activists routinely send e-mails that take it for granted that leaders hope to dissolve U.S. sovereignty soon. And Corsi, who routinely travels to speak to other activists, said he'll keep fighting against the threat whether it materializes or not.
"There's too much evidence for the points that I'm arguing," he said. "While it's not inevitable that they end up with a North American Union, it's certainly possible."
(c) 2007, USA TODAY International. Distributed by Tribune Media Services International.
このニュースの和訳米、カナダ、メキシコが統合へ？ 保守派懸念の北米連合構想
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