Colombian President Gustavo Petro addresses supporters throughout a rally in Ibague, Colombia, Oct. 3.
Fernando Vergara/AP
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Fernando Vergara/AP
WASHINGTON — The Trump administration imposed sanctions Friday on Colombian President Gustavo Petro, his household and a member of his authorities over accusations of involvement within the world drug commerce, sharply escalating tensions with the leftist chief of one of many closest U.S. allies in South America.
The Treasury Division leveled the penalties towards Petro; his spouse, Veronica del Socorro Alcocer Garcia; his son, Nicolas Fernando Petro Burgos; and Colombian Inside Minister Armando Alberto Benedetti.
Petro “has allowed drug cartels to flourish and refused to stop this activity,” Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent mentioned in an announcement. “President Trump is taking strong action to protect our nation and make clear that we will not tolerate the trafficking of drugs into our nation.”
The transfer ramps up a rising conflict between the Republican U.S. president and Colombia’s first leftist chief, notably over lethal American strikes on alleged drug-carrying boats off South America.
This week, the Trump administration expanded its crackdown to the japanese Pacific Ocean, the place a lot of the cocaine from the world’s largest producers, together with Colombia, is smuggled. And in an escalation of army firepower within the area, the U.S. army is sending an plane service to the waters off South America, the Pentagon introduced Friday.
The U.S. final month added Colombia, the highest recipient of American help within the area, to an inventory of countries failing to cooperate within the drug warfare for the primary time in nearly 30 years.
The penalties have been anticipated after Trump lately mentioned he would slash help to Colombia and impose tariffs on its exports, referring to Petro on social media in current days as “an illegal drug leader.”
“He’s a guy that is making a lot of drugs,” Trump advised reporters within the Oval Workplace on Wednesday. “He better watch it, or we’ll take very serious action against him and his country.”
After Trump accused him of getting ties to drug trafficking, Petro on Wednesday mentioned he would resort to the U.S. courtroom system to defend himself.
“Against the calumnies that high-ranking officials have hurled at me on U.S. soil, I will defend myself judicially with American lawyers in the U.S. courts,” Petro wrote on X with out naming Trump however citing a information report about his feedback.
A day earlier, Petro’s anti-drug coverage was the topic of a gathering between him and the U.S. chargé d’affaires in Colombia, John T. McNamara. McNamara additionally met with Overseas Minister Rosa Yolanda Villavicencio Mapy on Thursday.
Petro has repeatedly defended his coverage, which strikes away from a repressive method and prioritizes reaching agreements with growers of coca leaf — the uncooked materials for cocaine — to encourage them to modify to different crops, pursuing main drug lords and combating cash laundering. He has mentioned his authorities has achieved file cocaine seizures and questioned U.N. figures exhibiting file coca leaf cultivation and cocaine manufacturing.
The quantity of land devoted to cultivating coca, the bottom ingredient of cocaine, has nearly tripled up to now decade to a file 253,000 hectares (625,000 acres) in 2023, in response to the newest report accessible from the U.N. Workplace on Medicine and Crime. That’s about triple the scale of New York Metropolis.
The Trump administration has surged army ships and planes to Latin America to focus on traffickers accused of funneling medicine to the U.S. Petro has pushed again towards the strikes which have killed at the very least 37 folks since they began final month, with the newest two focusing on vessels within the japanese Pacific, the place Colombia has a shoreline.
Petro has repeatedly feuded with Trump this 12 months. Petro initially rejected U.S. army flights of deported migrants, main Trump to threaten tariffs. The State Division mentioned it could revoke Petro’s visa when he attended the U.N. Basic Meeting in New York as a result of he advised American troopers to disobey Trump’s orders.
