Colombia's Earthquake Response Raises Questions About Foreign Policy Shift

Colombia's new president, Abelardo de la Espriella, has faced criticism for his slow response to a deadly earthquake that struck the country, with some accusing him of prioritizing foreign policy over domestic needs.

De la Espriella's First Big Test Colombia's new president, Abelardo de la Espriella, has been in office for less than a week when a 7.4-magnitude earthquake hit the country on Monday. The epicenter of the quake was in the Chocó department, which is located between Bogotá and the Pacific coast and lies on a few fault lines. Colombian officials reported that at least 273 people had died, while a civilian-created tally reported that more than 4,000 were still missing. The earthquake response has dominated de la Espriella's first days in office and led to global offers of support. However, the new president was slow to embrace those overtures, highlighting a foreign-policy shakeup that he was already carrying out. Countries including Chile, Ecuador, El Salvador, Israel, Mexico, Peru, and the United States all offered assistance to Colombia early this week. But de la Espriella's administration at first said that it sought help only with equipment, not personnel. This decision sparked domestic criticism, with some cities struggling to try and rescue their trapped neighbors with untrained volunteer groups. On Wednesday, Bogotá changed its tune, saying that it would accept search and rescue help from Ecuador, El Salvador, Israel, and the United States. Colombian officials said that those four countries were chosen because they were internationally certified. However, commentators wondered whether the decision reflected de la Espriella's sharp turn toward the Trump administration and its allies. ## A Shift in Foreign Policy? When de la Espriella took office, the United States announced a new $1 billion security partnership with Colombia and plans to carry out joint military operations on Colombian soil. Colombia also ended diplomatic ties with Cuba and Nicaragua and restored them with Israel-moves that hewed closely to U.S. positions. What's more, de la Espriella added Colombia to the small list of countries that recognize Moroccan sovereignty over the disputed Western Sahara region. Colombia also became the only country besides the United States and Israel to recognize Israeli sovereignty over the occupied Golan Heights, triggering a formal protest to the United Nations by Syria and several of its neighbors. Colombian Foreign Minister Omar Bula denied that the government had chosen which rescuers to accept based on "ideological consideration." However, political analyst Sandra Borda pointed out that many other countries beyond those selected by Bogotá appeared to have U.N.-administered international certification for search and rescue operations. "It's going to cost us a lot to understand why we continue having difficulties rescuing so many people while at the same time deciding not to accept help," Borda posted. ## A Test of Institutions As the key 72-hour window for saving survivors neared its close on Thursday, little heavy equipment had arrived in the remote cities of Quibdó and San José del Palmar to clear rubble. "We've felt abandoned," San José del Pamar's mayor told France 24. Even so, the Colombian government's response to the earthquake has been quicker, more effective, and more transparent than Venezuela's response to its June disaster, thanks in large part to the functioning state institutions that Caracas lacks after years of autocracy. In the hours after Colombia's disaster, local and national officials gave updates on estimates of dead and injured. It was a contrast with Venezuela, where the government slowly released statistics that civil society groups widely considered a vast undercount. Colombia's military also arrived more quickly on the scene to help. Colombia's institutions may be further tested during de la Espriella's presidency. The president made radical claims on the campaign trail, saying he would "gut" the political left and jail its members. Some swing voters who aided in de la Espriella's victory trusted that Colombian institutions would constrain him, the podcast *El Hilo* reported last week. "It's not the president who can arrest someone," former Colombian official Luiz Guillermo Vélez, who voted for de la Espriella, said on the show. "This has been a country very resistant to authoritarian models since its independence.

Source: Foreign Policy