The president of Venezuela, Nicolás Maduro, shakes hands with the president of Colombia, Gustavo Petro, in Miraflores Palace, Caracas, on January 7, 2023. Photo: Twitter/@NicolasMaduro.
On Saturday, January 7, the president of Venezuela, Nicolás Maduro, received Colombian President Gustavo Petro at Miraflores Palace, where the two presidents held a meeting. After it ended, President Maduro announced that there is a clear path for joint work and cooperation between the two nations on different issues that will continue to yield positive results for both countries.
President Maduro wrote on his social media accounts that the meeting he had with his Colombian counterpart was exhaustive and very fruitful.
“With the President of the Republic of Colombia, Gustavo Petro, we had a broad and very fruitful meeting,” President Maduro wrote in a Twitter post. “We have a clear path of joint work that will continue to yield positive results for our countries, in different areas. Long live the union between Colombia and Venezuela!”
President Maduro added that with this visit, the president of Colombia, Gustavo Petro reaffirms “the path of union, work and common development of our peoples.”
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This is the second time since taking office that President Petro has officially visited Venezuela and met the Venezuelan president.
Petro for second time in Caracas. This is what being a real leader means. The opposite of being a prisoner of MSM blackmailing or a US puppet! https://t.co/EUhtcCPkjd
— Orinoco Tribune (@OrinocoTribune) January 7, 2023
The meeting took place within a week of the opening of the Atanasio Girardot International Bridge, popularly known as Puente Tienditas, and the total opening of land borders between the two countries, enabling passage for private, cargo and passenger transport.
The first meeting between the two presidents took place in November 2022, where they signed a joint declaration.
Petro’s visit is part of a tour that will take him to other countries in the region, as has already been reported. On Sunday, January 8, he is scheduled to travel to Santiago, Chile, where he will meet Chilean President Gabriel Boric and the presidents of Chilean Congress and Senate, on Monday.
ELN ceasefire issue
According to the Spanish daily El País, President Petro’s unannounced visit to Venezuela might be connected to what the newspaper calls “misunderstanding” between the Colombian government and the ELN about the ceasefire. The Spanish right-wing mainstream outlet even claimed that “the future of the negotiations is at stake,” a declaration that is not surprising taking into consideration that Europe’s interest is to keep the civil war alive in Colombia.
“Petro needs a coup after starting the year with a wrong move,” El País said. “On the last day of 2022, he announced the truce with the ELN, but three days later the guerrilla leaders corrected him: in reality they had not reached any deal. Petro’s own negotiators explained that the matter was still being discussed and that the president had been rash. His trip to Caracas should serve to reverse this situation and promote the process that, in theory, will continue in Mexico.”
Many analysts see the impasse about the ceasefire as a miscommunication incident with no real repercussions on the new phase of the Colombian peace negotiations, initiated in Caracas last year, especially given the willingness that both sides have shown in the negotiation process.
A close look at mainstream media and social media publications regarding this visit shows how right-wing operators are trying to sow controversy and portray some sort of hidden reason for the visit, in a clear attempt to smear the gigantic steps taken by the Venezuelan and Colombian authorities to normalize relations, and also—possibly—to derail the peace talks with the ELN.
(Últimas Noticias) by Carlos Eduardo Sánchez, with Orinoco Tribune content
Translation: Orinoco Tribune
OT/JRE/SC
