The Ministers of Finance of the Americas Monday in Guatemala started their annual meeting of the Inter-American Development Bank (IADB) with a call to work together and minimize poverty, but the debate is already faced with disagreement: the project to create the Bank of the South.

Some of the officials attending the meeting -the 48th annual assembly of IADB Governors- said the project should be taken seriously, but others believe the plan is only a joke, AP reported.

In any case, the creation of the Bank of the South -proposed by Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez- could become another factor for south-north polarization.

Since it is a Latin American initiative, some have labeled the project as an attempt at weakening Washington financial institutions, including IADB itself.

While the original idea was to create a bank to meet financial needs in South America, Chávez has tried to recruit Nicaragua and Haiti.

In Guatemala, Venezuelan Minister of Finance is lobbying looking for more support.

"We are waging an offensive," Cabezas conceded.

Chávez uses to tell his potential partners that once the Bank of the South is created, they will no longer have the need to "beg" for loans from Washington, which is also the seat of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund.

The Bank of the South has not started operations yet. Chávez expects to open the institution next June with an initial equity of USD 7 billion. The project has been endorsed so far by Argentina, Paraguay, Bolivia, Ecuador and potentially Nicaragua and Brazil.