“The friendship of the two peoples must be maintained, no matter what happens,” said Gustavo Petro in Caracas, when he had not yet completed 100 days as the first left-wing president of contemporary Colombia. “It is a reconciliation,” said its host, Nicolás Maduro, that same afternoon of November 1, 2022, in reference to what was the first meeting between presidents of two countries with deep connections of all kinds, and that came from a break in relations. diplomatic. Less than a year and a half later, the two presidents meet for the sixth time, now as the closing of a few weeks of distancing marked by Petro, who described the disqualification of the opponent María Corina Machado for the Venezuelan presidential elections, scheduled for July. A symbolic April 9 occurs, the date of the assassination of the liberal leader Jorge Eliécer Gaitán in 1948, whom Maduro called, a year ago, “a symbol of the struggles for the dignity of humble people.”
The rapprochement between Colombia and Venezuela, a log that already has two previous trips by Petro to Caracas and several presidential summit meetings, was frozen a few weeks ago due to calls made from Bogotá, initially in the voice of the acting foreign minister Luis Gilberto Murillo, to promote free, fair and competitive elections. Colombia's voice has not been the only warning voice in the international community, nor the only one among the countries with which Venezuela maintains good relations; Brazil also did so, in the face of the reversal that the Government of Nicolás Maduro has made to the commitments signed last year in Barbados. The Government of Nicolás Maduro has not only disqualified candidate Machado, but also prevented the registration of the person she designated as her replacement, academic Corina Yoris, and has imprisoned leaders of her Vente Venezuela party. Although Petro did not initially react to the disqualification, the latest maneuvers motivated his criticism, responded angrily by Maduro by pointing out, without names, a “cowardly left.”
With Petro's arrival at the Nariño Palace, not only were ambassadors re-appointed in both countries, or the formal reopening of a border that saw several million Venezuelan migrants pass through in the last decade. Maduro also regained dialogue with the world, after several years of diplomatic and economic isolation due to the authoritarian drift to which he led the country. The two presidents need each other. On the one hand, between 2022 and 2023 Petro tried to lead the solution to the Venezuelan conflict with efforts to resume the stalled talks between the Venezuelan Government and the Unitary Platform that brings together the opposition, which finally led to the Barbados agreement. A year ago, he organized a conference between countries to discuss the problems arising from the prolonged Venezuelan crisis that came to nothing and did not leave him in a very good position.
On the other hand, for Colombia, Venezuela's push for negotiations with the ELN guerrilla has been fundamental, the last one remaining in a country that has suffered decades of internal armed conflict. The dialogues, which have had rotating venues outside the country and began in Caracas, have had concrete results such as temporary ceasefires. However, they are advancing slowly and without producing greater enthusiasm in a society that sees its conflict worsening amid a proliferation of armed groups and Petro's ambitious and difficult policy to negotiate with all of them in parallel. Precisely, this month, from April 12 to 22, the talks will resume in the Venezuelan capital.
The latest friction between the presidents over the elections in Venezuela has left the economic issue buried on the bilateral agenda. One of the great bets and promises of the reactivation of relations was a trade that became the most important for the two countries in the nineties. Although after the opening of the border since September 2022 there was progress that resulted in an exchange for about 143 million dollars in the first year, it is still far from the records of decades ago. Despite the disagreements, Colombia has made progress in the reopening of five of its consulates in Venezuela, which this year have begun to provide services to their compatriots.
The overcoming of the diplomatic clash is evident not only by this Tuesday's visit, but also by the meeting of Foreign Ministers Murillo and Yván Gil this Monday in Cúcuta, the Colombian city that is the largest and most populated on the border between the two countries. At the meeting, the Colombian minister announced that the Maduro Government proposed that Colombia be an “election observer” in the July presidential elections. So far there has been no definitive response from the Petro Government.
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