\n<\/p>\n
Petro, however, has highlighted his interdiction efforts as a means of refuting Trump’s claims that he has allowed cocaine to flow unchecked.<\/p>\n
The subject reportedly came up during a call between the two heads of state in January. Petro suggested that Trump had been unfamiliar with the amounts of cocaine Colombia has seized.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe United States doesn\u2019t know anything about that,\u201d he told CBS News after the call.<\/p>\n
At other times, Petro has leaned on his interdiction record to push back on Trump\u2019s hardline anti-narcotics policy.<\/p>\n
In September, Trump and his allies announced a campaign to bomb boats suspected of carrying drugs, arguing the strategy was more efficient than interdiction.<\/p>\n
“Interdiction doesn\u2019t work,\u201d US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said. \u201cWhat will stop them is when you blow them up, when you get rid of them.\u201d<\/p>\n
Since then, the US military has bombed 47 boats, killing at least 163 people. Petro has condemned the strikes as \u201cmurders\u201d, arguing they violate due process and international law.<\/p>\n
He has also held up his own interdiction strategy as a more effective model.<\/p>\n
When Colombia and the US led a joint maritime operation in February that resulted in nearly 10 tonnes of cocaine seized, Petro touted the outcome as proof that anti-narcotics efforts need not be lethal.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Colombian Navy seized the submarine without killing anyone,\u201d Petro said during a cabinet meeting.<\/p>\n
Still, experts have pointed out that Petro has bent to US demands in other areas.<\/p>\n
While Petro had pledged not to target coca farmers, he announced in December that security forces would deploy drones to spray crops with glyphosate, an herbicide.<\/p>\n
That plan \u2014 to forcibly eradicate coca crops by air \u2014 faced strong local opposition due to concerns over the herbicide\u2019s health and environmental impacts.<\/p>\n
Rueda said the move, which has yet to be implemented, signalled that Petro, like many presidents before him, had yielded to US pressure.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe US government always wins,\u201d said Rueda. \u201cIt always has more power over us, and we end up having to give in \u2014 and so does Petro.\u201d<\/p>\n
Whether Petro\u2019s decision holds weight with his electoral base is less certain. While protests initially erupted in coca-growing regions, they subsided after meetings with his administration.<\/p>\n
Rueda suspects officials reassured protesters they wouldn\u2019t carry out the fumigations, which could have cost Petro in the upcoming elections.<\/p>\n
\u201cPetro\u2019s decision highlights his inconsistencies when it comes to the policy he put forward,” Rueda said. “But in the end, the fumigations never happened, so the political impact likely wasn\u2019t as significant as it could have been.”<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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Pushing back on Washington Petro, however, has highlighted his interdiction efforts as a means of refuting Trump’s claims that he has allowed cocaine to flow unchecked. The subject reportedly came up during a call between the two heads of state in January. Petro suggested that Trump had been unfamiliar with the amounts of cocaine Colombia […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":18910,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-18909","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-latin-america-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18909","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=18909"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18909\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/18910"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=18909"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=18909"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=18909"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}