Argentine President Javier Milei defined this Tuesday the goal with which he comes to the World Economic Forum in Davos (Switzerland): “To spread the ideas of freedom in a forum contaminated by the socialist agenda.” The right-wing extremists are on their way to the meeting that brings together managers, officials and business people from all over the world in the Alpine city every year. There he will present his government program and hopes to meet with world leaders. Until this Tuesday, the Casa Rosada confirmed a meeting with British Foreign Minister David Cameron and an audience with Kristalina Georgieva, head of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), which a week ago granted the South American country a payout of 4.7 billion dollars . The president will attend the meeting with a key government delegation on his first official foreign trip.
Milei took off on a scheduled flight from Buenos Aires on Monday and landed in Frankfurt, Germany this morning. During the flight, passengers lined up to be photographed with him and the president bellowed his usual slogan: “Long live freedom, damn it.” After another plane ride and a road trip, the president will arrive in Davos in the afternoon. On Wednesday he will speak at the summit together with the forum's executive president, Klaus Schwab. Milei will present his government program, which he began implementing last month, which includes a brutal adjustment and more than a thousand measures to deregulate the economy and transform the Argentine state. Some of the regulatory changes and repeals were imposed by decree, which is currently being challenged in court; Other measures must be passed by Congress, which has already started debating the package: there are parts of the opposition ready to support the plan, but none will approve it without the changes intended by the government.
The ultra-liberal experiment that Milei is carrying out in Argentina raises expectations at the summit, which this year will discuss some of the issues that are causing greater uncertainty about the economic outlook, such as the wars in Gaza and Ukraine or the dominance of the generative artificial intelligence. “The powerful understand that we have returned to the ideas of freedom and respect the capitalist system,” presidential spokesman Manuel Adorni said on Monday at the daily press conference he gives at the Casa Rosada. Although the Argentine delegation has scheduled meetings with representatives of banks, technology companies, pharmaceutical companies and other companies, as well as some state secretaries and ministers, the government had not confirmed a Milei meeting with foreign leaders as of Tuesday lunchtime.
The first confirmed meeting on the president's agenda was with Georgieva. With Milei's arrival at Casa Rosada, Argentina ushered in a new phase of relations with the Fund, highlighting the far-right's “ambitious plan” to adapt. The IMF visited Argentina last week and reached a technical agreement with the country to grant it a new disbursement of $4.7 billion, subject to board approval and “continuous and lasting implementation” of the new government's policies depends. Argentinians. The money is not a new loan, but corresponds to the disbursements that the fund had planned with Argentina between December last year and the first quarter of 2024. The country will use the payout to pay off its own debts to the organization amounting to 44,000 million dollars.
The government confirmed a second meeting on Milei's agenda for this Tuesday. The President will meet with David Cameron, the United Kingdom's Foreign Secretary. The Casa Rosad has not yet explained what the content of the meeting will be and whether or not there will be an agenda with predefined topics.
The far-right will be joined at the World Economic Forum by a key government delegation including Foreign Minister Diana Mondino; the Minister of Economy Luis Caputo; the chief of staff Nicolás Posse and the secretary of the presidential office Karina Milei, sister of the president. It is the first time in six years that the Argentine president is traveling to Switzerland to attend the summit, which this year will take place from January 15 to 19 and welcome delegations from more than 100 countries, international organizations and 1,000 companies. including civil society leaders, experts and entrepreneurs. In the last years of the government of the conservative Mauricio Macri (2015-2019) and during the term of office of the Peronist Alberto Fernández (2019-2023), other cabinet officials went to Switzerland – in 2021 Fernández took part, but practically due to the Covid-19 pandemic -19 —.
Barbecue at the Quinta de Olivos
Milei and his team met on Sunday at the president's residence in the town of Olivos to hold a cabinet meeting before the trip to Davos. Milei's meetings with his cabinet are scheduled for Tuesdays and Thursdays at the Casa Rosada, the executive headquarters, in central Buenos Aires. But this week it was organized that way because the president will be away until Friday morning. Following the two-hour meeting, there was a “Roman-style” barbecue where everyone “did their part,” Milei said in an interview. “I take care of building the house, then I give the order and there are people who take care of the rest,” he said.
“One of the themes of the day was to review the balance we have drawn from the first month of government and the 1,040 measures that we have pushed forward in these days of administration,” Adorni said this Monday about the meeting and concluded : “We are satisfied that this residence will be used for work again.”
The president moved into the official residence just before a month in office was over. Until then, the president was staying in the suite of a four-star hotel in the Argentine capital, an accommodation that was also the operational center of his La Libertad Avanza party during the election campaign. According to the government, the move was delayed in part due to the construction of cages for his four mastiffs. The dogs continue to stay in a dog daycare center. “We are making progress with the construction of the kennels. Soon my little children will be staying at Quinta de Olivos,” Milei said in a social media message.
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