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The ex-president made the revelations when he was asked in La W if one of the first steps that the Colombian government should take with the new president was change Ambassador Francisco Santos.
According to the former president, his cousin spoke with “a strategist, a Pentagon contractor that has helped Colombia a lot ”in the governments of Andrés Pastrana, Álvaro Uribe and yours:
“[El embajador] called him [al contratista] and I ask ‘Look, I want to see how I help Trump, how we can do something to help Trump,’ and he even raised the possibility that Duque would go to Miami or WashingtonJuan Manuel Santos said, saying that the contractor himself would have told him personally.
His answer, Santos Calderón continued, was blunt: “‘Look, ambassador, don’t make that mistake’He told her so, crazy. One of the most important things that Colombia has with the United States is its bipartisan politics. That could even be illegal“.
Juan Manuel Santos also recalled the episode that Francisco Santos starred with Ambassador Claudia Blum when he spoke ill of the US State Department to highlight that the image of the ambassador since then is not the best in that country.
Although the Nobel Peace Prize winner noted that President-elect Joe Biden “is not vindictive,” he said the possible attempt to intervene in the past elections it could have “consequences in Congress when aid projects arrive in Colombia”.
Pacho Santos announces lawsuit against his cousin
In an interview with Noticias Caracol, Ambassador Francisco Santos denied that he had had that conversation and announced a “lawsuit for slander and injury” against his cousin, assuring that “he will have to tell who the alleged advisor is” and “rectify or clarify” what was said .
Although he did not mention his cousin initially, the diplomat said that “there are people who are doing politics for personal or ideological reasons, who what they want is to harm Colombia’s relationship with the United States“.
Santos, who already spoke of some points in which the binational relationship with the new president would change, did refer to the aforementioned intervention of two Colombian congressmen in Florida during the US elections, saying that “One thing is two parliamentarians from the Democratic Center and another thing is the Government“.
On this issue, which generated a verbal admonition from the US ambassador to Colombia, the ambassador also acknowledged that both Senator María Fernanda Cabal and Representative Juan David Vélez, “They must answer for it”, but he said that “they are within their rights” because “it has nothing to do with the position of the Government.”
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