Colombia recalled its ambassador to the United States on Monday after President Donald Trump threatened to impose additional tariffs on the South American nation and strike drug production fields within its borders.
“The Ambassador of Colombia to the United States, Daniel García-Peña, has been recalled to Bogotá for consultations by President Gustavo Petro Urrego,” Colombian Foreign Minister Rosa Yolanda Villavicencio Mapy wrote on X. “The Government of Colombia will announce the corresponding decisions in due course.”
In a separate post, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said it will provide an update about the situation involving the recalled U.S. ambassador later Monday.
The development comes in the wake of the U.S. military’s strikes on alleged drug-carrying boats affiliated with Venezuela and Colombia sailing in the Caribbean region toward the U.S.
The Trump administration has confirmed seven known strikes on such vessels, the latest being a boat operated by a designated terrorist organization from Colombia. All three people aboard the vessel, or “narco-terrorists” as Secretary of War Pete Hegseth said, died in that strike.
While Trump maintains the U.S. military is only eliminating terrorists and drug traffickers, Colombian President Gustavo Petro argues otherwise.
The foreign leader accused the U.S. of murdering a fisherman in one of its strikes last month. The allegation preceded Trump’s fiery response on Sunday.
“President Gustavo Petro, of Colombia, is an illegal drug leader strongly encouraging the massive production of drugs, in big and small fields, all over Colombia,” he wrote on Truth Social. “It has become the biggest business in Colombia, by far, and Petro does nothing to stop it, despite large scale payments and subsidies from the USA that are nothing more than a long term rip off of America.”
Trump then said he would pull subsidies from Colombia as punishment for facilitating drug production. He also urged Petro to close the drug fields, or else the U.S. will do it for him through force.
TRUMP TEASES NEW COLOMBIA TARIFF OVER DRUG TRAFFICKING
As for the threatened tariffs, Trump did not reveal many details other than the fact that he would announce the specific rate sometime Monday. Colombia currently pays 10% tariffs that Trump initially imposed in April.
Another recent U.S. strike targeted a drug-carrying submarine and killed two people aboard. The remaining two survivors, one from Ecuador and the other from Colombia, were repatriated to their respective nations.
