For noon this Friday, July 14, the trip from Colombia to Belgium of the President of the Republic, Gustavo Petro, is scheduled. This will be his 21st trip in his 11-month rule. According to Casa de Nariño, he was traveling to Brussels to attend the Summit of the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (Celac) – European Union.
In that conference, to which world leaders and some foreign ministers are summoned, issues of great importance for all the nations that comprise them, such as politics, trade and culture, will be discussed. The Colombian president will represent the country in this international event, which will begin this Friday the 14th and will go until next Tuesday, July 18.
The other countries that make up Celac, whose heads of government will meet with the President of the Republic of Colombia, are Antigua and Barbuda, Argentina, Bahamas, Barbados, Belize, Bolivia, Brazil (suspended its participation since 2020), Costa Rica, Cuba, Chile, Dominica, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Grenada, Guatemala, Guyana, Haiti, Honduras, Jamaica, Mexico, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Saint Lucia, Suriname, Trinidad and Tobago, Uruguay and Venezuela.
Among the issues that will be addressed this year, and in which Colombia will assume the pro tempore presidency until 2025, it was learned that several of the aforementioned States will request the European Union to carry out reparation work for the slavery to which it subjected Latin Americans in the last century.
Likewise, it is expected that issues of current interest to the whole world will be discussed, such as the conflict between Russia and Ukraine and that the energy transition for which the Colombian head of state has advocated since he came to power in August 2022 is advocated.
“CELAC is taking place at a difficult time due to the war in Ukraine against the Russian invasion and all the effects that this has on the European and global levels. We would like it to be an approximation based on the integration of our region with Europe, of the common fight against the climate crisis and of the co-responsibility that we have towards the world; that it should not be considered as a precaution against the presence of China on the continent, because if it were to develop in this way, it would seem that everything would revolve around being on the defensive of, and not by virtue of,” said Jorge Rojas, Colombian ambassador. in Belgium, in an interview with the newspaper El Espectador.
For now, more details of President Petro’s agenda in Brussels, the capital of Belgium, are known. However, this adds to another of the various trips that he has made in the first seven months of 2023 in America and Europe, which has not saved him from criticism from the opposition and some outraged Colombians.
These are Gustavo Petro’s trips in the first half of the year:
Brazil: January 1-2 Venezuela: January 7 Chile: January 9-10 Switzerland: January 16-20 France: January 20-22 Argentina: January 24 Ecuador: January 31 Dominican Republic: March 24-25 United States: April 16-21 Spain and Portugal: May 2-5 Brazil: May 30-31 Cuba: June 9 Germany: June 14-17 France: June 21 June to June 23
In addition, days ago, Petro announced that, like Vice President Francia Márquez, he would travel to Africa. “Personally, I am going to go to Kenya, Africa, in September, to the meeting of the African Union to achieve a South America-Africa alliance. We are aiming for the COP in Dubai”, the president announced from Paris a few days ago. with Infobae