Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador began a tour of Colombia and Chile on Friday to strengthen alliances with the South American left, which he has vehemently defended despite diplomatic costs such as current strained relations with Peru, one of his partners in the Pacific Alliance .
López Obrador is making his sixth foreign trip in the last year of his six-year term in office, during which international politics was not at the forefront and which he always left in the hands of former Foreign Minister Marcelo Ebrard, who parted ways with the government in the middle of the year to take care of himself to promote the pro-government presidential candidacy, which he lost this week.
The Mexican president arrived in the Colombian city of Cali on Friday afternoon to hold a meeting with his Colombian counterpart Gustavo Petro to discuss the Andean country’s peace process and the strengthening of the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States group (Celac), which includes 33 countries and was founded in 2010.
Also read: Mexico demands that Texas investigate an incident at the border in which one person was injured
López Obrador and his delegation, consisting of Foreign Minister Alicia Bárcena and the Ministers of National Defense and Navy, Luis Cresencio Sandoval and José Rafael Ojeda, will attend on Saturday the final conference of the Latin American and Caribbean Conference on Promoted Drugs by Petro, a regional dialogue on to address the structural causes of drug trafficking and explore measures to address this problem. At the end of the event, the ruler will leave for Santiago de Chile.
During the visit to Colombia, Foreign Minister Bárcena will sign a memorandum of understanding for the Mexican International Development Cooperation Agency to implement in Colombia the state programs Sembrando Vida to support small farmers and Jóvenes Construyendo el Futuro to support young people with limited income resources.
Likewise, Bárcena will sign a memorandum of understanding with Colombian Vice President Francia Márquez to strengthen and promote the rights of indigenous and Afro-Colombian peoples.
Also read: Mexico sends 1,200 more soldiers to the violent Michoacán region
In the Chilean capital on Sunday, López Obrador will meet with Chilean President Gabriel Boric at La Moneda Palace and then travel with his wife Beatriz Gutiérrez to the Mexican ambassador’s residence to preside over a memorial ceremony marking the 50th anniversary of Chile’s exile in Mexico.
The Mexican Order of the Aztec Eagle in the collar rank, the highest honor given to foreigners, is awarded posthumously to President Salvador Allende, who was overthrown in the military coup of September 11, 1973 and committed suicide. The award is accepted by Allende’s daughter, Senator María Isabel Allende Bussi.
On September 11, the Mexican ruler will take part in the commemoration of the 50th anniversary of the coup in Chile and then return to Mexico.
López Obrador announced this week that he would avoid transiting through Peruvian airspace on his trip to South America due to strained relations he has with the government of Dina Boluarte, which he described as a “usurper.”
Also read: The US and the international community condemn the assassination of the presidential candidate in Ecuador
Relations between Mexico and Peru have deteriorated in recent months after López Obrador announced in May that he did not want trade or economic ties with Lima as long as Boluarte remained in power.
Mexico’s decision came after Peruvian congressmen decided that the president was not welcome in the country due to his constant interference in Peru’s internal affairs, in light of López Obrador’s comments following the ouster of former leftist President Pedro Castillo, which the Mexican politician called on had defended various occasions.
Boluarte, for his part, ordered the Mexican ambassador to Lima, Pablo Monroy, to leave the country last December for speaking out in favor of Castillo, and announced two months later that he was withdrawing the Peruvian diplomat from Mexico.
Tensions escalated after López Obrador refused to temporarily hand Peru the presidency of the Pacific Alliance, saying he did not want to “legitimize a coup.” To ease tensions between the bloc’s partners, which include Colombia, Chile, Mexico and Peru, the Boric government took over the group’s presidency in late June and handed it over to Lima in August.
Also read: Mexican foreign minister reaffirms commitment to immigration cooperation during visit to Washington
Carlos Cerda Dueñas, professor at the Faculty of Social Sciences and Government of the Tecnológico de Monterrey, said that this sixth tour has a “very symbolic” burden on López Obrador because he “identifies very strongly with the Allende era and its struggle” . The Chilean left the country after the military coup.
Regarding the possibility that this trip will usher in a period of greater presidential involvement in international politics, Cerda Dueñas expressed doubts, saying that it is very possible that López Obrador will continue to focus on domestic politics, which is his great passion, especially when the next year is approaching. 2024 presidential election period.
The president plans to travel to San Francisco (USA) in November to meet with his counterpart Joe Biden as part of the Asia-Pacific Alliance summit.
In May last year, López Obrador visited Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Belize and Cuba as part of his first international trip to a country other than the United States, where he has traveled four times.
Since taking office in 2018, the 69-year-old Mexican president has hardly traveled abroad. López Obrador has admitted that this is because “flights affect him a lot.”