Héctor Villagrán
Profesor de Estudios Latinoamericanos de la Universidad de la Lengua y Cultura de Beijing (BLCU). Director del Centro para Diálogo Civilizacional China-ALC del Centro Mundial de Sinología de BLCU. Máster en Derecho Chino de la Universidad de Tsinghua. Abogado de la Universidad de Guayaquil. Ex Ministro de Transporte y Obras Públicas del Ecuador y Ex Representante de Comercio e Inversiones del Ecuador en China.
Discurso de incorporación como Director del Centro para el Diálogo Civilizacional China-ALC en el Centro de Sinología Mundial en la ciudad de Qingdao, Provincia de Shandong, 1 de Junio de 2024 (versión original en inglés)
We have come from different nations of Latin America and the Caribbean.
Our land is the result of historical events that led to fusion of different Civilizations. Recent genetic studies have shown that our Asian ancestors left their land to settle in our territory more than 25.000 years ago and most of our traceable ancient population came from the northern part of Asia.
This Ancient population that inhabited what we call now the Americas build great new civilizations advanced in astronomy, mathematics and science that allowed them to build great road, bridges and amazing monuments in large cities under a well-organized planning and orderly coexistence led by strong leaders as Montezuma in the north and Atahualpa in the South in the most recent time but with an heritage of succession and honoring of ancestors.
Our Civilization has a great genetic contribution from our African ancestors. Ancient African philosophy and religions play a key role in our Americas. The struggle for freedom led by the first territory that abolished slavery allows us in this wonderful morning in China to honor Alexander Sabes Petion. A continental leader that not only helped his own land to be free from colonial powers but expanded his influence on the southern part of the Americas with dedicated support and financial help to Simon Bolivar. I am sure the contemporary African heritage leaders like Martin Luther King, Malcom X and Jessie Jackson have taken the lessons from the Petion the Great to maintain alive the struggle for equality and freedom for all.
Our European heritage lets our land have a contribution from various sources specially from Civilizations that flourished in the Mediterranean Sea, North Africa, and the Middle East. The Iberian Peninsula was colonized in the bronze age by the mythical Phoenicians. This Middle Eastern Civilization expanded to form the Carthaginian Empire. Still in Latin America we remember and honor the names of Amilcar, Asdrubal and Anibal. Later the Peninsula became Hispania and part of the Roman Empire, leaders and Trajano and Adriano born in this territory were later Emperors of Rome. Germanic tribes had their chance to contribute to this great ancestry with their domination of Europe that expanded to Spain and Portugal creating new ways and forms until the Arabic Caliphate expansion to North Africa and the Iberian Peninsula led to around 800 years of Civilization that let us today honor philosophers like Avicenna and Averroes and admire their tolerance for religions and architecture.
In all we are like The Liberator Simon Bolivar said: We are a new Civilization. Our new Civilization have the contribution from genetic origins as different and diverse shaped by nature.
Then our civilization is also the civilization of the Caribbean, Pacific and Atlantic Seas.
Our Civilization shaped by great peaks at Cordillera de los Mayas, Sierra Madre de Chiapas, Cordillera de Guanacaste, Cordillera Talamanca, La Serranía del Darién and la Cordillera de los Andes among other great elevations
Río Bravo, Río Grande, Rio Culiacan and Amazon, Orinoco, Rio de la Plata, Guayas, Paraná, Magdalena Rivers gave this new Civilization a unique environment.
I Will conclude by celebrating this day June the 1. Is international Childrens Day but it might also in the future the Civilizations Day. The moment in which the inhabitants of our planet take to look back into the past and look forward to the future of shared peace and happiness. More than to 200 years ago Simon Bolivar did that in 1815 in the Caribbean city of Kingston, Jamaica wrote what we know now as Carta de Jamaica. In the final part of this vision of the future for Latin America and the Caribbean, Simon Bolivar, The Liberator wrote:
” When success is not assured, when the state is weak, and when results are distantly seen, all men hesitate; opinion is divided, passions rage, and the enemy fans these passions in order to win an easy victory because of them. As soon as we are strong and under the guidance of a nation which will lend us her protection, we will achieve accord in cultivating the virtues and talents that lead to glory. Then will we march majestically toward that great prosperity for which South America is destined. Then will those sciences and arts which, born in the East, have enlightened Europe, wing their way to a free Colombia, which will cordially bid them welcome.”
This is the right time for a Civilization Dialogue between China and Latin America and The Caribbean.