Never in the republican history of Peru, for two centuries, had the country’s relations with three governments in the region been reduced to business leaders. Over the past four months, there has been an escalation in tension, the latest flare-up occurring in the last days of March, when President Dina Boluarte announced the permanent withdrawal of Peru’s ambassador to Colombia. A month earlier, the Peruvian government had taken an equally radical decision with Mexico and Honduras. What happened to trigger these fractures with countries with which Peru has a long tradition of bilateral relations?

The origin dates back to last December 7, when Pedro Castillo tried to carry out a coup that dissolved in a few hours and for which he was sentenced to 18 months in pre-trial detention. Later, the judge imposed a second measure of 36 months. to be the alleged leader of a criminal organization. Castillo was arrested the same afternoon as he went to the Mexican Embassy in Lima to seek political asylum. The day after the bankruptcy of his company, when Dina Boluarte had already crossed the presidential sash to be its first vice-president, an authority visited him at the headquarters of the Special Operations Directorate (Diroes), where he was held. It was Pablo Monroy, the Mexican ambassador to Peru. Two weeks later, Monroy forcibly boarded a flight to Mexico City: the Boluarte government declared him persona non grata and expelled him from the country. It was precisely Monroy who, at that time, received the former first lady, Lilia Paredes and the children of Pedro Castillo, to whom the government of Andrés Manuel López Obrador granted asylum.

Throughout, the Mexican president has not only put up a strong defense of Castillo, but spared no qualification for Boluarte, whom he has so far failed to recognize as Peru’s constitutional leader. He also refused him the delivery of the presidency pro tempore of the Pacific Alliance, a regional integration initiative that they share with Colombia and Chile. “I’ve seen polls where the fake president has 15% approval […]. Mexico will continue to support the illegally overthrown president and we will continue to demand his release,” said López Obrador.

His Colombian counterpart, Gustavo Petro, took the same position against Boluarte. He described law enforcement’s crackdown on protesters as a “massacre” and even went so far as to say that in Peru, the national police are “marching like Nazis against their own people, violating the American Convention on to human rights”. In mid-February, the Peruvian Congress declared Petro persona non grata.

On this occasion, the Colombian Foreign Ministry tried to calm the waters, arguing that it was “an act of a political nature” which does not “affect relations” between the two nations. However, this came to nothing, because a month later, at the XXVIII Ibero-American Summit, in Santo Domingo, the decibels rose again when Petro claimed that Pedro Castillo had been the victim of a coup. “He should be here, they took him. He is in prison”, he said. This deserved an immediate response at the same event from the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Ana Cecilia Gervasi: “If Pedro Castillo is not here, it means that he organized a coup. On March 29, the executive ordered the permanent withdrawal of the Peruvian ambassador to Colombia, Félix Denegri Boza. As had happened, in February, with the dismissal of diplomats Manuel Talavera Espinar in Mexico and Jorge Raffo Carbajal in Honduras.

Internationalist Ramiro Escobar has been watching Peru’s relations with his peers in the region with concern since Dina Boluarte came to power. “We are in a trend of isolation. We have open fronts with several countries. It is necessary to repair these cracks, because we are at an important moment in Latin America, where the continent is transforming politically”.

Escobar says solutions to those differences should have been exhausted before making decisions of this caliber. “Diplomatic missions could be sent. Before taking the step of the permanent withdrawal of an ambassador, there are preliminary steps such as discreet diplomacy. Everything can be done to negotiate and seek consensus. Torre Tagle has always distinguished itself as a prudent and intelligent foreign minister, always looking for the best relations with neighboring countries, which are very important circles of interest. But a tough foreign policy is unfolding. It appears that the State Department is following the logic of the Congressional Foreign Relations Committee. It will be difficult to reverse these distances,” he explains.

For his part, Francisco Belaunde, also an internationalist, underlines that the Peruvian reaction is a protest against the position of the leaders who delegitimize the government. “It is not a desire to isolate Peru, but a derivation of the fact that there are more left-wing governments in the region, some of which have decided to play for Castillo. Rather than isolate themselves from him -even, the Boluarte government sees itself isolated by governments that do not recognize it.”

Belaunde emphasizes the importance of forms in political dialogue, especially when it comes to a head of state. “All countries have the right to speak out on issues of democracy and human rights, but how you do that is very important. The European Union and the United States have spoken in a very diplomatic way what is happening in the context of protests against the government, very different from the statements of López Obrador and Petro. It was inevitable to react to governments that expressed political opinions that could be considered interference, “says Xiomara Castro, President of Honduras, for example, called for the release of Pedro Castillo during the CELAC summit in Buenos Aires.

Peru’s relations with Mexico, Colombia and Honduras have been reduced to business leaders. This means that commercial ties remain, but political ties are disrupted. A concrete effect of the current tensions is that Mexico has given up participating in the Lima International Book Fair 2023, which will take place in July. Mexico was the guest country of honour.

“Basically, there is a problem that the leaders concerned must take into account. While presidents direct foreign policy, foreign ministries and career diplomats are the ones who strive to keep it on track. They are the professionals,” says Ramiro Escobar. It is up to everyone to put cold sheets on the conflict and not to deteriorate relations further. This is the mission, and the great difficulty, for the months to come.

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