RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo reiterated on Saturday from Colombia that the ELN guerrillas and the FARC dissidents that have departed from the Colombian peace process are welcomed on the other side of the border with Venezuela, an action that cannot be tolerated.
The regime “has provided safe refuge, aid and shelters for terrorists,” he asserted after meeting with the host country’s president Ivan Duque. “Nicolás Maduro is a criminal against humanity,” replied the Colombian president, referring to the new UN report that accused the Chavista government of crimes this week like torture and murder.
“This bleeding has to stop,” Duque said after recalling that, as a senator, he denounced Maduro before the International Criminal Court. “There is a regime of violations of human rights in a systematic way,” said the president about the neighboring country, and the international community “has to act so that this situation ends.”
Duque assumed power two years ago with a promise to isolate the heir of Hugo Chávez, whom he does not recognize and calls a “usurper.” As the main promoter of this “diplomatic siege”, in tune with Washington, the Colombian chief executive has also become the great support of Juan Guaidó, the leader of the National Assembly recognized by nearly 60 countries as the president in charge facing a critical moment before the legislative elections called for the end of the year. That unrestricted support for Guaidó has raised the tension between two countries that share a border of more than 2,200 kilometers.
Colombia is also the main host country for the diaspora that is fleeing driven by hyperinflation, insecurity, or the shortage of food and medicine. with 1.7 million Venezuelans settled in its territory, according to figures from immigration authorities. “We have had a fraternal policy to serve Venezuelan sisters and brothers, but we know that the situation there is unsustainable,” added Duque, praised by the head of US diplomacy for having attended to refugees during the COVID-19 pandemic. “Colombians should be proud,” Pompeo said.
At the last stop on a short regional tour, Pompeo, who called Duque “a true leader for the region,” has made sure to reactivate pressure on Maduro. While in the Brazilian city of Boa Vista, capital of the state of Roraima, bordering Venezuela, where he was received by Foreign Minister Ernesto Araújo, Pompeo described the Venezuelan president as a “drug trafficker” and reiterated that the United States intends to remove him from power. “Maduro has to go,” he had stated in Guyana, where he met President Irfaan Ali, and his tone was similar in Suriname, where he met President Chan Santokhi. He will leave Colombia this Saturday for Texas, a state with an important Latino community, a key electorate in Donald Trump’s campaign for re-election.
It is Pompeo’s fourth trip to Colombia since Duque came to power. He had already praised his commitment to reestablishing democracy in Venezuela when he visited Cartagena in January 2019, Then, in April, he visited the border city of Cúcuta to learn first-hand about the humanitarian impact of the migration crisis, and earlier this year he met in Bogotá with both Duque and Guaidó. in the framework of an antiterrorist summit.
The meeting took place at the same police academy where a car bomb attack by the National Liberation Army, the last active guerrilla force in Colombia, caused the deaths of 22 young police officers. The Duque government has repeatedly denounced, even at the UN General Assembly, that Venezuela has become a “sanctuary” for illegal Colombian armed groups, and that the ELN, backed by chavista authorities, maintains a rearguard on the other side of the border. Pompeo also thanked Duque on Saturday, as he did before, “for his leadership in the fight against Hezbollah in the hemisphere,” because exerting all the pressure on the Lebanese militia, whom he called Iran’s representative, “is fundamental for peace and security for all peoples.”
Colombia, the privileged partner
The presence of the Secretary of State in the Colombian seat of government represents Bogotá’s position as a privileged partner of the Trump Administration in the region. During the meeting, they discussed issues related to the management of the pandemic, economic reactivation, regional security, the fight against drug trafficking and transnational terrorism, as well as the situation of Venezuelan migrants, according to the Presidency.
They also talked about the Colombia Crece strategy, “a new chapter in the bilateral relationship,” according to Duque. The program seeks to attract US investment and allocate US$5 billion to the development of rural areas in the South American country, and was launched on August 17 as part of the campaign of Mauricio Claver-Carone for the presidency of the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB).
In that recent diplomatic event, Colombia was one of the first and most enthusiastic promoters of Claver-Carone, against regional pressure and despite the fact that his name breaks the tradition of keeping a Latin American at the head of the organization. As former President Álvaro Uribe (2002-2010), his political mentor, had already done with George W. Bush, Duque has played for a diplomacy aligned with Washington, an ally in the fight against drugs and counterinsurgency since Plan Colombia was launched at the turn of the century. Bogotá exhibits this close alliance with Trump despite the risk of being thrown off balance by an eventual defeat of the Republican in the November elections that would mean the arrival of Democrat Joe Biden in the White House. Several analysts warn of the danger of breaking the diplomatic tradition of seeking a bipartisan consensus in Washington
Despite the good feeling around Venezuela, the United States has on several occasions aired its concern about the extension of coca leaf cultivation in Colombia, a source of friction. This same week, the Trump administration certified Bogotá in its fight against narcotics, but accompanied that memorandum with a warning for the “unacceptably high levels” of drug crops. The total area went from 169,000 to 154,000 hectares at the end of last year, according to the official UN measurement, a slight decrease compared to the record 171,000 hectares in 2017.