He Peruvian Congress declared this Friday persona non grata to the president of Colombia, Gustavo Petro, in rejection of his statements against the Peruvian National Police (PNP) and asked the authorities to guarantee that he “does not enter the national territory.”
The decision received 72 votes in favor, 29 against, and 7 abstentions from the plenary session. The motion that raised this measure referred to some statements that Petro made last Friday, when he mentioned the extensive deployment of the PNP in the historic center of Lima the day beforein response to an anti-government demonstration.
Related topics
“In Peru, (the police) march like Nazis, against their own people, breaking the American Convention on Human Rights,” said the Colombian president.
(Keep reading: The keys to the rallies and Petro’s speech, back in the campaign).
The Colombian president added that said convention “does not apply only to leftist governments”, “double standards for those who do that. It applies to all governments and that is our position,” added the president.
The motion that raised this measure was approved last Tuesday by the Foreign Relations Commission, chaired by the conservative deputy María del Carmen Alva, who considered at that time that Petro’s expressions were “regrettable, really shameful.”
(Also: Video: Petro asks the Prosecutor’s Office to investigate attacks on journalists in Medellín).
This Friday, Alva remarked before the plenary session that the Peruvian Congress is “defending the National Police,” after which he emphasized that “no one can offend them by saying that they are Nazi troops.”
Specifically, the motion proposed to express its rejection of Petro’s “unacceptable” expressions, considering that these constitute an “offense” to the PNP, the Peruvian State and “all the Jewish people” by “trivializing the Holocaust.”
(Also read: Indigenous protesters tried to enter Congress; Police prevented it).
He also asked to declare Petro persona non grata and urge the Ministries of the Interior and Foreign Relations to carry out “the necessary steps” to guarantee that the Colombian president “does not enter the national territory.”
Last January, the Peruvian government expressed through a diplomatic letter its “strong protest against a new act of interference” by Petro in internal political affairs, after it ruled on the eviction of hundreds of protesters at a university in Lima.
(Keep reading: Petro toughens speech after suspension of SAE director and calls to march).
“Raid universities. Shout Death to intelligence! The OAS Permanent Council must be summoned to examine the case of Peru,” the Colombian president said on that occasion, who last December repeatedly came out in defense of former Peruvian president Pedro Castillo, after his failed self-coup.
The Peruvian Parliament already approved at the end of last year a parliamentary motion rejecting “the constant acts of interference in the internal affairs” of the country by Petro and his Mexican counterpart, Andrés Manuel López Obrador.
(Also: Petro Reforms: the keys to a week of balcony and marches).
Likewise, the government of Dina Boluarte had shown in December its “deep discomfort” over Petro’s statements in support of Castillo, considering them an “unacceptable” interference in the country’s internal affairs in another diplomatic note.
Peru has already declared the Mexican ambassador in Lima, Pablo Monroy, and former Bolivian president Evo Morales persona non grata “for his constant incitement in national politics” which, always in Parliament’s opinion, seek to “unbalance the internal order of the country.”
More news:
Álvaro Uribe: his harsh criticism of Gustavo Petro’s health reform
What’s next for the Conservative Party with Efraín Cepeda as president?
Marelen Castillo to Francia Márquez: “Height is expected from a Vice President”
EFE