Bogotá.- The president of Colombia, Gustavo Petro, stated this Tuesday that the United States must return Nicolás Maduro to Venezuela so that he can be judged by a court in that country, and criticized the military attack on January 3 in Caracas, in which the president was captured.
“They have to return him (to Maduro) and let a Venezuelan court judge him, not an American one, because Latin American civilization is different from European Anglo-Saxon civilization“, Petro said in an excited speech in a hospital in Bogotá.
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However, he added that U.S. President Donald Trump and Maduro
“are alike, because they believe in oil, like (former Colombian President Álvaro) Uribe; they are the same”.
Petro, who plans to meet with Trump on February 3 at the White House, added that “bombing Caracas, the homeland of Bolívar” is not “an act against Maduro” but against the country.
The Colombian head of state made the statement when questioning the use of force as a mechanism to resolve political disputes in the region and warning about the consequences of a military intervention in Venezuela.
“How do they dare to bomb Bolivar’s homeland? That mark will not be against Maduro, even if he dies in a United States prison. That mark is historical, it will never be forgotten,” he said.
Criticisms of the UN
The Colombian president framed his speech as a criticism of the current international order and the role of the United Nations, considering, in line with his US counterpart, that the organization is going through a “decline” and “is ending because it was not able to stop the genocide in Gaza”.
Petro maintained that overcoming that system should not occur through the use of force or military interventions, but rather from a conception of “human brotherhood” which, according to him, is above the logic of States.
On January 3, when the United States attacked Caracas where Maduro was captured, Petro denounced the incursion ordered by Trump and called the arrest of the Venezuelan president by US forces a “kidnapping”, something he reiterated this Tuesday.
Call to Arms
Petro’s statement comes a week before the meeting he has scheduled with Trump at the White House, after a year of disagreements between the two leaders that began on January 26, 2025, when the Colombian president refused to receive a flight with migrants from the United States, denouncing “undignified treatment” for his countrymen.
Petro, who presents himself as a South American jaguar that rivals the American eagle and who feared a military operation against him like the one that captured Maduro, was scheduled to give a harsh speech against Trump on January 7 at an event for sovereignty in Plaza de Bolívar, in Bogotá, but the tension subsided minutes before going on stage thanks to a phone call between the two in which they agreed to meet.
“Trump changed my speech, but it is written and two people have it, someday they will publish it, because it was my call to how we had to move like a jaguar the day Petro fell in the (presidential) palace guarding Bolivar’s sword,” recalled the Colombian president today.
According to Petro, his intention was to “invite all the soldiers of Colombia who, with or without permission, would arrive with their rifles and ammunition to become liberating guards alongside the presidential guard battalion, which Bolívar founded.”
Since that January 7th, the president had remained silent about the bilateral relationship, both on social media and in his speeches, until today when he resumed his usual rhetoric.
