Duque to discuss support for peace and Venezuelans with Spanish foreign minister

Spain's support for Colombia's peace agreement and attention to the Venezuelan migration crisis will be discussed during a visit to the country this week by Spanish Foreign Minister Arancha González Laya, President Iván Duque said on Tuesday.

The president, who received the new Colombian ambassador to Spain, Luis Guillermo Plata, stressed that the European country has been a great ally in the implementation of peace in Colombia, so he hopes to continue to count on its support.

"We will continue to ask the Kingdom of Spain for its collaboration in the implementation of peace with legality; they have been with us in the territories, looking at projects with a territorial approach, and also looking at demining projects," he added.

Minister González Laya will arrive in Colombia next Thursday to strengthen bilateral relations and to see on the ground the situation and needs of Venezuelan immigrants in the border city of Cúcuta.

Duque stressed that González Laya will review the Temporary Protection Statute for Venezuelan Migrants, the charter of rights that the Colombian government announced on 8 February to benefit some two million regular or irregular Venezuelans in the country.

"Spain has played a fundamental role in the coordination of the donor roundtables, both with King Felipe and with the President (of the Government, Pedro) Sánchez, we have managed to ensure that they understand the scope of this measure and we want Spain to be an articulator so that this international aid moves from declarations to disbursements", Duque stressed.

According to data from Migración Colombia, as of 31 December last year there were 1.72 million Venezuelan migrants in the country, of whom nearly one million are undocumented and some 800,000 have their status regularised.

During her three-day visit to Colombia, the Spanish minister plans to meet in Bogotá with Duque and his foreign minister, Claudia Blum, as well as with businessmen and representatives of the Truth Commission and the Special Justice for Peace, institutions created by the agreement signed with the former FARC guerrillas in November 2016.

The Spanish minister will close her trip on Saturday in Cúcuta, where she will see the situation of Venezuelan migrants on the ground.

The president explained that another of the pillars that unites his country with Spain is the fight against transnational crime, for which he entrusted Ambassador Plata as one of his first tasks to achieve the extradition of Luis Jhon Castro Ramírez, alias "El Zarco", who was arrested this month in Alicante.

Castro is accused of having deceived and handed over to the Colombian army 14 young men who were later killed and presented as guerrillas killed in combat, in what are known as "false positives".

"I hope we continue working to dismantle drug trafficking networks," Duque added, stressing that thanks to judicial cooperation between the two countries, Colombia has had "record numbers" in extraditions and drug seizures.