Russian Leaders Divide Up Latin America

// The Russian president will be friends with Colombia, and the prime minister with Venezuela

Colombian Vice President Francisco Santos Calderon arrived in Moscow on Monday. Today he will meet with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and he will meet President Dmitry Medvedev at the end of the week. The negotiations may symbolize a change in foreign policy under the new president. Vladimir Putin never held negotiations with Colombian authorities and oriented himself toward their opponent, Venezuelan leader Hugo Chavez. There is no indication that Putin will meet with Santos. He will continue to occupy himself with the Venezuelan side of Russian politics.
Colombian Vice President Francisco Santos began his visit to Moscow on June 1. He is the highest official from that country ever to visit Russia. He has a full schedule for the visit. Today he meets Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and Patriarch Alexiy II. He will spend June 6-8 in St. Petersburg, where he will meet with Russian President Dmitry Medvedev at the economic forum. This visit is unusual in that Russia has never had close relations with Colombia. On the contrary, Russia’s key partner in Latin America has been Venezuela. The presidents of the two countries, Alvaro Uribe of Colombia and Hugo Chavez of Venezuela, are known for their longstanding mutual enmity. Uribe accuses Chavez of sponsoring the Colombian FARC rebels who have been waging war against Bogota for years. Colombian authorities also suspect that Chavez is sending weapons bought in Russia to FARC. Chavez accuses Colombia of preparing to invade Venezuela.

The long (ten-day) visit by the vice president (who will visit Kazan beside Moscow and St. Petersburg) shows that the closeness of Moscow and Caracas does not suit Bogota and it would like to run interference in that alliance by laying claim to some of Russia’s attention as well.

The article published in Kommersant on May 27 stating that one of the main goals of Santos’s negotiations was military-technical cooperation elicited a wide response in Colombia. Santos stated that his visit is not limited to that goal and it has geopolitical and economic importance. However, he admitted openly that Colombia is unhappy with the volume of weapons that Venezuela is buying in Russia. “If they ask me whether Venezuela’s arms purchases disturb us, I will say yes. But we keep in mind that Russia strictly adheres to international obligations in that area,” Santos said.

Colombian diplomats have also emphatically denied that weapons supplies will even be discussed. A Kommersant source in Rosoboronexport stated that negotiations with the Colombian vice president are planned. The company does not expect to cut any specific deals, since everyone understands that, given the complex nature of Colombian-Venezuelan relations, the decision on cooperation of that type should be political.

Nonetheless, Colombia has started to catch up to Venezuela even in the time of Santos’s visit. Chavez has been to Moscow several times on official visits. Uribe has never visited Moscow. On Monday, Colombian Ambassador to Russia Diego Tobon announced that Uribe’s first official visit to Moscow would take place in October. The exact date has still to be agreed upon, but, according to information obtained by Kommersant, it will be discussed today by Santos and Lavrov at the Foreign Ministry.

Chavez has had clear problems visiting Russia in recent months. His visit was originally planned for the end of February. That visit was postponed at the last minute. The official reason was Chavez’s exceptionally busy schedule in connection with the freeing of hostages taken by Colombian FARC rebels. Then it appeared in the media that Chavez would be able to come in May. Later, the date of July 10 was set.

Reportedly, a contract for the delivery of about $2 billion worth of Russian military technology is to be signed when the presidents of Russia and Venezuela meet. Specifically, that is four Project 636 submarines, ten Russian Il-76MD-90 military transport planes, ten new Russian Mi-28NE Night Hunter strike helicopters and two Il-78MK refueling planes. “If relations between Russia and Venezuela were good in the time of President Putin, they will be even better in the time of President Medvedev,” said Venezuelan Ambassador to Russia Alexis Navarro Rojas.

Nonetheless, problems have arisen in Russian-Venezuelan relations. In spite of the agreement reached last year between Chavez and Putin, Russia has yet to provide Venezuela with a $5-billion credit for the purchase of Russian arms.

As a result, Chavez’s July visit has all but been cancelled. Sources blame different factors. Some information indicates the cause is Medvedev’s busy schedule. Others say that Chavez is once again the postponer, because he is offended that Moscow has so graciously received the Colombian vice president. It is expected that Venezuelan Vice President Ramon Carrizalez, cochairman with Russian Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Zhukov of the bilateral intergovernmental commission, to reach an agreement on a new schedule for the Venezuelan president’s visit. Obviously, that will be a very delicate dialog because the dates for Uribe’s visit to Moscow will be known by then.

Relations between Moscow and Caracas are also complicated by the fact that, in the middle of May, an international group of Interpol experts confirmed the authenticity of Colombia’s evidence of the connections between the Venezuelan and the leadership of the FARC movement. On March 1, Colombian forces carried out a special operation near the Ecuadorian border during which FARC second-in-command Raul Reyes was killed. Then the Colombian special services announced that portable computers were found at the site of the camp that was eliminated. Those computers contained material proving the connections between Ecuadorian and Venezuelan authorities and FARC. According to the Interpol specialists, the hard disks on the captured computers were authentic.

That fact means that the United States may in the near future initiate the process to have Venezuela declared a state sponsor of international terrorism and impose sanctions on Caracas. That could have a very negative impact on military-technical cooperation between Russia and Venezuela.

Nonetheless, even though it is diversifying its partners in Latin America, the Russian leadership does not plan to change its priorities. Kommersant has learned that no meeting between Santos and Putin is planned, but Putin is maintaining his contacts with Chavez.

All the Article in Russian as of June 04, 2008