Colombian Defense Minister Pedro Sanchez has insisted that his country is “absolutely committed” to combatting drug trafficking, as the United States mulls whether to blacklist the country for failing to curb cocaine exports.
US President Donald Trump’s administration is to decide by September 15 whether to decertify Colombia as an ally in the battle against drugs.
At risk is nearly half a billion dollars in US funding to combat cartels and left-wing guerrillas funded by cocaine trafficking.
The decision looms in the midst of a major US military buildup in the Caribbean, part of Trump’s war on cartels, which saw US forces blow up a suspected Venezuelan drug boat with 11 people on board.
Sanchez told AFP that the US certification was “a symbol of cooperation, of alliance, of trust” between Washington and Bogota.
During a tour of a coca eradication program on Colombia’s border with Ecuador on Friday, he said US military assistance was crucial to allow Colombia to “act more forcefully” against traffickers.
Decertification, he said, would mean “illegal players win and nations lose.”
– ‘Given absolutely everything’ –
Since coming to power in 2022, Colombia’s leftist President Gustavo Petro has championed a paradigm shift in the US-led war on drugs, which it considers a failure, to tackling the social problems that fuel drug trafficking.
Since 2022, coca cultivation has increased by about 70 percent, according to Colombian government and UN estimates.
Sanchez assured that the government had “given absolutely everything” to the anti-drug fight.
“There is absolute commitment here,” he assured.
US decertification would be a major blow to Colombia, where the military and police are reeling from a string of deadly attacks by guerrilla groups.
On August 21, 12 police officers were killed when breakaway members of the defunct FARC rebel group shot down a police helicopter during a coca eradication operation in the country’s northwest.
On the same day, a truck bomb was detonated on a busy street near a military aviation school in the city of Cali, killing six people.
Sanchez said the uptick in violence was a result of the government’s clampdown on drug trafficking, which he likened to a “cancer.”
“When you fight cancer and apply chemotherapy (…) there is a response,” he argued.
Many Colombian officials however fear the US decision could go against the country, following a blazing row between Trump and Petro in January over migrant deportations.
Petro sent Colombian planes to repatriate migrants after Trump threatened sanctions on the South American country.
