WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump abruptly modified his tone Wednesday about his Colombian counterpart, Gustavo Petro, saying they’d exchanged a pleasant cellphone name and he’d even invited the chief of the South American nation to the White Home.
“It was a Nice Honor to talk with the President of Colombia, Gustavo Petro, who known as to elucidate the state of affairs of medication and different disagreements that we’ve got had,” Trump posted on his social media website. “I appreciated his name and tone, and stay up for assembly him within the close to future.” He mentioned that assembly would happen on the White Home.
That got here mere days after Trump mentioned within the wake of the U.S. operation to oust Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro over the weekend that “Colombia may be very sick too” and accused Petro of ”making cocaine and promoting it to the USA.”
In feedback to reporters aboard Air Drive One on Sunday, Trump added of Petro, “He’s not going to be doing it very lengthy, let me inform you.” Requested whether or not U.S. intervention was potential, Trump responded, ”Sounds good to me.”
Trump now immediately warming to Prieto is particularly stunning since Colombia’s president known as the U.S. operation in Venezuela an “abhorrent” violation of Latin American sovereignty and instructed it was dedicated by “enslavers” and constituted a “spectacle of loss of life” corresponding to Nazi Germany’s 1937 carpet bombing of Guernica, Spain.
Earlier than Trump’s conciliatory submit, tensions had been rising between the U.S. and Colombia for months.
The Trump administration imposed sanctions in October on Petro, his household and a member of his authorities over accusations of involvement within the international drug commerce. Colombia is taken into account the epicenter of the world’s cocaine commerce.
Trump started his monthslong stress marketing campaign on Maduro by ordering dozens of deadly strikes on alleged drug smuggling boats launched from Venezuela within the Caribbean. He finally expanded the operations to additionally goal suspected vessels within the jap Pacific that got here from Colombia.
The U.S. in September added Colombia, the highest recipient of American help within the area, to a listing of countries failing to cooperate within the drug battle for the primary time in virtually 30 years. The designation led to a slashing of U.S. help to the nation.
“He has cocaine mills and cocaine factories,” Trump mentioned of Prieto on Sunday. “He’s not going to be doing it.”
