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Colombia, Ecuador FMs discuss normalization of ties

27 August 2010 02:19 (UTC +04:00)

Baku-APA. Colombian Foreign Minister Maria Angela Holguin and her Ecuadorian counterpart Ricardo Patino began on Thursday a meeting aimed to restore the diplomatic ties between the two countries, which were severed in March 2008, APA reports quoting news.xinhuanet.com website.

The meeting began at 9:50 a.m. local time (1450 GMT), and was held in surrounding areas of Rumichaca Bridge, a border point where the customs controls between the two countries are located.

Among the topics to be discussed by both ministers are security in the border and the infrastructure’s development of communications and energy.

Colombia’s ambassador to Quito, Ricardo Montenegro, said to local media that the agenda will pick up the results of the work tables between the two countries, which started on Wednesday.

Montenegro added that "the issue of displaced people is not on the agenda. Only the positive agenda will be treated. They also will not talk about the request made by the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) to speak in the Union of South American Nations (Unasur)."

Montenegro said that the issue of the infrastructure development of the creation of hydroelectric plants in surrounding areas of Chiles Volcano, which has already been checked by the managers of the energetic portfolios of both countries, is part of the agenda.

Montenegro also said that there will be a great impulse to cultural agreements and that the Colombian Culture Minister Mariana Garces will offer to turn Custom houses in the zone into houses of bi-national culture.

Tensions between Colombian former President Alvaro Uribe and Ecuadorian President Rafael Correa led to the breakoff of the diplomatic ties between the two countries, which only until 2009 were recovered at a business level.

On Aug. 7, after new Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos took charge, Ecuadorian President Correa had a meeting with him in which many of the relations’ impasses were discussed and the normalization of diplomatic ties were back on track.