() — Gustavo Petro, President of Colombia, and Joe Biden, President of the United States, met this Thursday at the White House, in the first bilateral meeting between the two presidents since they took office.
Biden welcomed Petro and said he considers Colombia “the key to the hemisphere” to ensure that it is “united, equal, democratic and economically prosperous.”
In addition, he promised an investment of US$500 million for the Amazon Fund, as part of the efforts of the two nations to face climate change. With this contribution, the United States would be one of the largest donors to this international conservation program, which it established during the previous term of President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva to protect the Amazon rainforest from deforestation.
At the Oval Office meeting, Biden also spoke about efforts to combat drug trafficking in the region and “to address the historic levels of migration in the hemisphere.”
For his part, Petro highlighted in the conversation the values of democracy, freedom and peace in the relationship between the two countries, as well as the need to move towards an economy without coal or oil, according to a statement from the Colombian Presidency.
“We also have in common that our continent has almost never had wars between nations and between peoples. We are well accustomed to peace and not to war. Therefore, democracy, freedom and peace constitute the common agenda. And he added: “We have to move from greed for the fossil to an economy that does not use coal and oil.”
Biden highlights “the hospitality and support that Colombia continues to provide to Venezuelan refugees”
President Biden thanked Petro “for the hospitality and support that Colombia continues to provide to Venezuelan refugees.”
“It is something humanitarian and generous what they are doing,” he added. “They know that we are working closely with regional partners to help Columbia meet this challenge. It is consequential and expensive, ”she completed.
Previously, the Colombian Presidency indicated in a statement that the presidents would address issues “such as climate change, the energy transition, peace efforts, anti-drug policy, and trade and investment opportunities.”
“It is a meeting of two people who are different, obviously, who have some points in common on the international agenda. Undoubtedly the climate issue is a common agenda between President Biden and us,” Petro said in Washington before the meeting.
In this sense, he added that “undoubtedly there are differences” and between the two governments and referred to the policy against drugs. “We believe that the war on drugs has failed. These 50 years show an absolutely disastrous balance in numbers, both here in the United States and in all of our Latin America”, he maintained. “So we want to open the discussion on this issue and how international drug policy is articulated with the growth of violence throughout the Americas and violence in Colombia.”
For this meeting, only a small group of journalists was able to see the leaders when they began their bilateral meeting in the Oval Office of the White House.
Petro is visiting Washington as part of a five-day trip to the US to celebrate the 200th anniversary of US-Colombia relations. She has held talks at the United Nations and the Organization of American States and visited the Capitol to meet with congressmen on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
A analysis shows that of the 47 face-to-face bilateral meetings Biden has held with world leaders since taking office, only 12 have featured joint press conferences.
By contrast, by this point in their presidencies, former President Donald Trump had held 34 joint press conferences with other world leaders following bilateral meetings; former President Barack Obama, 30; and former President George W. Bush, 36 joint press conferences, according to data from the American Presidency Project at the University of California at Santa Barbara.
With information from DJ Judd and Stefano Pozzebon
