Venezuela's official withdrawal from the Group of Three -which also comprises Mexico and Colombia- "will not adversely affect the domestic economy," said the State Minister for Integration and Foreign Trade Gustavo Márquez.

"We will have to assess and deal with some effects," the official claimed. "This needs to be done and is within the plans of the Government."

This move "is not intended to severe ties with Mexico and Colombia, but to rearrange such relations through bilateral agreements," Márquez said.

He explained that G3 was basically organized "to open the doors for Venezuela to join the Free Trade Agreement of the Americas (FTAA)." "The fact that Colombia and Venezuela -both countries of the Andean Community of Nations- entered into a partnership with Mexico makes no sense. The only possible explanation is that they were luring us into the FTAA."

The minister claimed that withdrawal from this integration mechanism "is the result of the sovereign policy of our Government to boost integration with the South."

According to Márquez, the automotive sector and the car spare parts sector have been seriously damaged under G3. "If G3 had continued to move forward, by 2010 all of the car spare parts imported from Mexico to Venezuela would be levied with zero custom tariffs. By 2011, cars assembled in Mexico and imported to Venezuela would be free from custom tariffs, which would amount to the death of the Venezuelan automotive sector" which creates a significant number of jobs and provides strong support to the metallurgic and metal-mechanics industries.