Pedro Sánchez is traveling today to Colombia, Ecuador and Honduras accompanied by more than a dozen businessmen on a tour in which he will support the new cycle of leftist governments that seems to be opening in Latin America, with the case of President Gustavo Petro as the most paradigmatic .
The meeting with the Colombian leader tomorrow in Bogotá is the highlight of the trip, due to the powerful political significance of the arrival of a left-wing leader to the presidency of Colombia, a country with a long tradition of liberal and right-wing governments, in addition to the controversy aroused by the figure of Petro, who belonged to the M19 guerrilla in his youth, and who has placed a charismatic indigenous leader, Francia Márquez, as vice president.
But the visit is also important because of its economic content, since there are more than 1,000 Spanish companies with investments in that country, in addition to the great business expectations that are opening up at this time in the field of renewable energies, infrastructures and tourism, in full expansion thanks to the disappearance of the violence of a large part of the guerrilla groups after the peace agreements.
In Honduras there is also a new progressive government, that of Xiomara Castro. There the president's agenda will focus on cooperation. And in Ecuador, although President Guillermo Lasso is conservative, the visit responds to an invitation from him when he was recently in Moncloa. There are many ties between that country and Spain, where Ecuadorians are the third largest foreign community. And no president has come to Quito since 1999.
The tour is part of the preparations for the semester of the Spanish presidency of the EU, in the second half of 2023. Sánchez thus promotes the European strategy of trying to regain influence in Latin America when other actors, such as China or Russia, are gaining ground with investments in the region to find allies on the international stage. Precisely, during the Spanish presidency of the EU, a summit will be held between Europe and Latin America to strengthen these cultural, political and economic ties.
