Colombia expels Argentine ambassadors after Milei insults

The childish behavior of the president of Argentina, Javier Milei, has caused noise throughout Latin America. This Wednesday (27), Colombia ordered the expulsion of diplomats from the Argentine embassy in Bogotá. The move follows a series of insults from Argentine President Javier Milei, where he called his Colombian counterpart, Gustavo Petro, a “murderer” and “terrorist”.

“In this context, the Government of Colombia orders the expulsion of diplomats from the Argentine embassy in Colombia,” said the Colombian Ministry of Foreign Affairs in a statement, without specifying which employees will be removed.

This is not the first time that Milei has insulted Petro. In January of this year, the Argentine president called the Colombian president a “murderous communist”.

At the time, the Colombian government said that Milei’s words “ignore and violate the deep bonds of friendship, understanding and cooperation that have historically united Colombia and Argentina, strengthened over two centuries.”

“The Argentine president’s expressions deteriorated our nation’s confidence, in addition to offending the dignity of President Petro, who was democratically elected,” the Colombian government said in a statement.

The decision comes after Milei said, in an interview, that “you can’t expect much from someone who was a terrorist murderer”, in reference to Petro’s guerrilla past.

It is not the first time that the Argentine extreme leader has created friction in the region. In February, in the wake of the Brazilian press’ irresponsible criticism of President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, the Argentine republished videos of former president Jair Bolsonaro’s (PL) demonstration on Avenida Paulista, in São Paulo, after being searched and seized by the Federal police.

Some of the publications criticized Lula, speaking of “authoritarianism” and “dictatorship”; another associates him with the extremist group Hamas.

Last Friday (22), Chilean congressmen rejected the stance of Argentina’s ambassador to the country, Jorge Faurie. That week, the local newspaper The counter published a sentence said by Faurie that caused diplomatic tension between the two countries.

“My country was already an agricultural powerhouse while you had just learned to eat,” the ambassador reportedly told Chilean embassy employees. The phrase was even refuted by far-right congressmen in the country.

In another absurd situation, Venezuela closed its airspace to flights from Argentina after the country seized a Boeing 747, from the Venezuelan state company Emtrasur. The aircraft was handed over to the Americans by the Milei government. The Venezuelan chancellor called the Argentine government “neonazi” and said that President Javier Milei’s administration is “submissive and obedient to the imperial master”, in reference to the USA.