VHeadline News Editor Patrick J. O'Donoghue reports:  Colombian Foreign Minister Gabriel Silva has been putting his foot in it left right and center. Yesterday, the Minister said that Colombia has not ruled out leaving the Union of South American Nations (Unasur), if the rest of member countries do not show the required "sensibility" towards topics that concern Colombia.

The Minister also dismissed the meeting of Unasur foreign and defense ministers in Quito, stating there was a confabulation against Colombia on the part of certain countries.

• Colombia's concerns, Silva declared, are narco-trafficking, the armament race and organized crime, concerns which were not addressed during the Quito meeting.

Later, the Defense Minister brushed aside a mediation offer from Spanish Prime Minister, Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero using a Spanish phrase "zapatero a tus zapatos" (cobbler should stick to his last). Silva was forced to produce a public apology to Zapatero and the Spanish people, saying he used the phrase after meeting coffee-producers whose language is not as "elegant as that of diplomatic circles." Spain's offer, the Minister retracted, is welcome because Spain has been an important partner not just in defense but also in foreign affairs. However, he added, the Colombian government does not consider the offer to mediate between Colombia and Venezuela "useful" or "convenient" at this moment in time.

President Chavez, meanwhile, has said that Venezuela would not insist on guarantees from Colombia regarding its military agreement with the USA. Chavez insisted that the US presence in Colombia is to conspire against Venezuela and for that reason has called on citizens to prepare to defend their homeland. According to the President, the Colombian government finds itself completely isolated in Unasur for its failure to explain the range of the military agreement with the USA.

Venezuela's representative before the Organization of American States (OAS), Roy Chaderton Matos maintained that Venezuela has no "appetite for war" and that the percentage of GDP used in military weapons is lower than that of neighboring countries. Chaderton Matos told the OAS permanent council that Venezuela is open to the transparency demanded by the Unasur defense council and has rejected what he calls the "artificial concern turned into threat against Venezuela's security by US secretary of state, Hillary Clinton regarding Venezuela's supposed arms race and lack of transparency."

Since 1825, the diplomat argued, Venezuela has not taken part in any international war and only did so to help free the sister countries in their struggle against the imperial powers of the time.

Chaderton Matos said it was an insult to the intelligence of Latin American and Caribbean peoples to accuse Venezuela of passing weapons on to neighboring countries.

Patrick J. O'Donoghue
news.editor@vheadline.com