The President of Colombia, Gustavo Petro, has not ruled out Wednesday breaking relations with Guatemala due to the corruption accusations that the Attorney General of that country has launched against the head of Defense, Ivan Velasquez, assuring that they will go «as far as they want to take the situation».
President Petro’s statements contrast with those of the Colombian Minister of Foreign Affairs, Alvaro Leyva, who hours before had assured that diplomatic relations were not in danger and that the calls for consultations to the ambassadors of both countries were «a natural response».
«Our Minister of Defense respects himself, our President respects himself and we are not going to kneel the national sovereignty before a corrupt action, whoever it may come from», he said, thus responding to his Guatemalan counterpart, Alejandro Giammattei, who tried to delegitimize the Colombian by appealing to his past as a guerrilla fighter.
«What they are doing is taking revenge for an action that was against impunity, taken by the United Nations, not by the Colombian government, but with a citizen at the head who deserves all the respect», Petro stressed in declarations given to the press during his visit to the World Economic Forum in Davos.
«We will not accept these revenges of politicians and corrupt people, especially when they try to violate national sovereignty», said Petro, who criticized those who try to «imprison» those who «fight against corruption in the world».
At the same time, he also clarified the first version of the Colombian side that assured that the accusations were a judicial matter and not a matter of the Guatemalan Executive, stressing that as the arrest warrant is against a government official, «the government is involved and will act as such».
This Tuesday, prosecutor Rafael Curruchiche -sanctioned by the United States for obstructing corruption cases- accused Minister Velásquez of being part of a corrupt scheme woven by the Brazilian construction company Odebrecth when he was part of the International Commission Against Impunity in Guatemala.
Source: (EUROPA PRESS)
