{"id":1964478,"date":"2026-05-30T20:40:07","date_gmt":"2026-05-30T17:40:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/?p=1964478"},"modified":"2026-05-30T20:40:07","modified_gmt":"2026-05-30T17:40:07","slug":"ecuador-accused-of-meddling-in-colombian-election-with-tariff-vow","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/?p=1964478","title":{"rendered":"Ecuador accused of meddling in Colombian election with tariff vow"},"content":{"rendered":"

[analyse_image type=”featured” src=”https:\/\/ichef.bbci.co.uk\/news\/1024\/branded_news\/eb63\/live\/ba67e470-5c61-11f1-aeb2-75cc9209ef5d.jpg”]<\/p>\n

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\"GettyGetty Images<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
Ecuadorian President Daniel Noboa was accused of “meddling” in Colombia’s poll<\/figcaption><\/div>\n<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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Colombia’s foreign ministry has accused Ecuador’s president of “deliberate interference” in its forthcoming election after he promised a right-wing candidate he would lift tariffs.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Daniel Noboa framed his conversation with Colombian presidential hopeful Abelardo de la Espriella on Friday as one with an administration-in-waiting, saying the two had “reached an agreement” on trade and security.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Colombia heads to the polls on Sunday to elect a new president, in an atmosphere of intense political polarisation.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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The outcome of the election could redefine which countries the Latin American nation aligns itself with, and how the government intends to tackle drug gangs amid spiralling violence.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Left-wing President Gustavo Petro, who is unable to seek re-election, has repeatedly sparred with his US counterpart Donald Trump over a number of issues including drug trafficking and American intervention in the region.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Noboa, a staunch ally of the US president, has taken a hard line on drug-related violence and has joined a US-led alliance aimed at fighting cartels.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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He wrote that he had decided to drop Ecuador’s tariffs on Colombian products as of 1 June following his conversation with de la Espriella, and said the two had “agreed on the handover of Ecuadorian criminals who are in Colombian territory”.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Ecuador has gradually imposed tariffs on imports from Colombia since January, citing what it described as Bogot\u00e1’s failure to secure their shared border.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Its geographical location – sandwiched between Colombia and Peru, the world’s largest producers of cocaine – has turned Ecuador into a key transit country for the illicit drug.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Petro’s government has denied the accusation and responded with economic measures of its own.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Colombia’s foreign ministry criticised “the misleading presentation of the decision to repeal the tariffs as a goodwill measure by the Ecuadorian leader” in a statement on Saturday.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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“This meddling by a foreign leader in the democratic process of another state constitutes a flagrant violation of the principle of non-intervention in internal affairs, a threat to national sovereignty and an attack on the democratic system,” it added.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Colombia’s political culture had for decades often favoured centrist technocrats for the presidency.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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But its politics has become increasingly polarised, with Petro becoming Colombia’s first left-wing president in its recent history.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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None of the candidates in Sunday’s poll appear likely to win an outright majority, with a run-off vote scheduled for 21 June.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Polling suggests Petro’s choice of successor, Iv\u00e1n Cepeda, has the greatest support, with de la Espriella his next-closest rival.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Cepeda has promised to continue with the Petro administration’s policy of “total peace”, which sought negotiated settlements with armed insurgent groups that engage in drug trafficking – though talks have stalled and agreements broken with renewed violence.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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De la Espriella and centre-right candidate Paloma Valencia have vowed to launch a military crackdown if elected.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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\"GettyGetty Images<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
Right-wing presidential candidate Abelardo de la Espriella appeared behind bulletproof glass at a rally last week<\/figcaption><\/div>\n<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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This is something Noboa has tried in Ecuador – deploying 75,000 police officers to the nation’s four most violence-wracked provinces in March – though his prior attempts have seen the country’s murder rate skyrocket.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Colombia’s presidential hopefuls have campaigned amid persistent political violence, with one candidate fatally shot last summer. Last week, de la Espriella appeared at a rally in Medellin behind bulletproof glass.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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He and Valencia have expressed a desire to restore Colombia’s close security alliance with the US, which has come under strain under Petro and Trump.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Cepeda has insisted, just as Petro did, that Colombia should not be a “vassal state” to the US – though observers have noted that the two nations’ historic anti-drugs co-operation has continued during even the most heated disputes.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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The capture by US forces of Venezuela’s former President Nicol\u00e1s Maduro in January has left Petro one of the region’s few remaining left-wing leaders not ideologically aligned with the Trump administration.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Both Trump and Petro have indicated that they thought a US military intervention in Colombia was possible, after the US president revived the Monroe Doctrine, that the US should be the sole arbiter when it came to the Western hemisphere.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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However, Trump has since turned his attention to Cuba and has openly discussed toppling the Communist regime there, which he has described as “ready to fall”. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/article>\n

[analyse_source url=”https:\/\/www.bbc.com\/news\/articles\/czx2zndk7elo”]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

[analyse_image type=”featured” src=”https:\/\/ichef.bbci.co.uk\/news\/1024\/branded_news\/eb63\/live\/ba67e470-5c61-11f1-aeb2-75cc9209ef5d.jpg”] Getty Images Ecuadorian President Daniel Noboa was accused of “meddling” in Colombia’s poll Colombia’s foreign ministry has accused Ecuador’s president of “deliberate interference” in its forthcoming election after he promised a right-wing candidate he would lift tariffs. Daniel Noboa framed his conversation with Colombian presidential hopeful Abelardo de la Espriella on Friday […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[35,226],"class_list":["post-1964478","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics","tag-bbc-com","tag-crawlmanager"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1964478","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1964478"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1964478\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1964478"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1964478"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1964478"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}