COLOMBIA SEEKS SUPPORT FOR U.S. TROOPS PACT / THE FINANCIAL TIMES

Colombia seeks support for US troops pact

By Naomi Mapstone in Lima and Benedict Mander in Caracas

Published: August 4 2009 19:01

Álvaro Uribe, Colombia’s president, has embarked on a hearts-and-minds mission across South America following a hardening of opposition within the region to his decision to grant US troops access to several military bases.

Already strained relations between Colombia and ­Venezuela and Ecuador, its leftist neighbours, have worsened over the decision to increase the number of US troops in Colombia from 300 to between 800 and 1,500 as part of a pact it says will strengthen its campaign against leftist guerrillas and drug cartels.

Mr.Uribe will visit Peru, Chile, Brazil and Paraguay, and meet the presidents of Argentina, Bolivia and Uruguay on the trip ahead of a special August 10 meeting of Union of South American Nations (Unasur) leaders in Quito to debate the issue.

Hugo Chávez, Venezuela’s president, has accused Colombia of establishing a platform from which it could attack its neighbours. Evo Morales, Bolivia’s president, said a decision by any Latin American leader to allow US bases would be a “treasonable act”.

Until July, the US had ­co-ordinated its counter­narcotics efforts out of a base in Ecuador but Rafael Correa, Ecuador’s president, refused to renew the lease following a raid last year by Colombian troops on a leftist guerrilla camp on Ecuadorean soil. Raul Reyes, leader of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (Farc), was killed in the raid and Colombian troops seized a laptop that the government said contained documents alleging Venezuelan and Ecuadorean ties to the guerrillas, something both governments have denied.

Opposition to Colombia’s pact with the US is not limited to the political left, however. Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, president of Brazil, said he “regrets” Mr Uribe’s decision but that, “just as I wouldn’t want Uribe interfering in my government, I’m not going to interfere in his”. But Celso Amorim, Brazil’s foreign minister, was quoted in a São Paulo newspaper this weekend as saying he was worried about “a strong military presence whose aim and capability seems to go well beyond what might be needed inside Colombia”.

Michele Bachelet, Chile’s president and interim head of Unasur, has said she shares Mr da Silva’s concerns fully.

The most vocal of Colombia’s critics, however, has been Mr Chávez who put the two countries’ relations “under review” as a direct consequence of Mr Uribe’s decision. After Colombia accused Venezuela of supplying Farc guerillas with rocket launchers, Venezuela’s leader last week proceeded to “freeze” diplomatic and economic relations, withdrawing Venezuela’s ambassador from Bogotá because of Colombia’s “aggressions”.
Mr Chávez said the bases would be “a threat” to Venezuela’s national security and sovereignty, adding that to describe them as “Colombian” was a “euphemism” since they would become de facto US bases.

Bilateral trade exceeded $7bn last year and analysts doubt trade will suffer ­significantly, although Mr Chávez’s threats of expropriating Colombian businesses in Venezuela cannot be dismissed.

Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2009