Petro Demands Release of Colombian Activist Held as 'Political Prisoner' by ICE - EUROPE SAYS
Colombian President Gustavo Petro on Saturday demanded that US PresidentDonald Trump“tell the people of Colombia” where activist Beto Coral is after he wasdetainedbyimmigrationagents this week following his. . .
Colombian President Gustavo Petro on Saturday demanded that US PresidentDonald Trump“tell the people of Colombia” where activist Beto Coral is after he wasdetainedbyimmigrationagents this week following his criticism of Trump’s preferred candidate in Colombia’s presidential election. Coral, a progressive activist and Petro supporter, was arrested by USImmigration and Customs Enforcement(ICE) agents at his Phoenix home on Tuesday, immediately after US Secretary of StateMarco Rubioissued a memo claiming that Coral “has used his presence in theUnited Statesto conduct political activity in support of the Petro government. ”His family says they now have no idea where he is. Coral is the son ofHumberto Coral Caballero, a police captain who was involved in the 1993 operation that located and killed the notorious drug lord Pablo Escobar. His father was murdered just four months later, in a case that remains unsolved. The younger Coral immigrated to the US in 2015 on a six-month tourist visa. He later applied for asylum in the US, saying he faced danger from drug cartels in Colombia. Although theUS Department of Homeland Securityhas also accused him of overstaying his visa for 10 years, the State Department memo pointed to his political activity. “Allowing [Coral] to remain in the United States,” Rubio’s memo said, “undermines US foreign policy interests in Colombia’s democratic processes and signals that foreign nationals may use US platforms to conduct politically motivated disinformation campaigns and litigation targeting foreign democratic actors without consequence. ”The memo reflects the State Department policy of seeking to deport foreign nationals explicitly over their expression of political viewpoints at odds with theTrump administration, particularly pro-Palestinianstudent activistssuch asMahmoud KhalilofColumbia Universityand Rümeysa Öztürk of Tufts University. Rubio’s memo also noted that Coral had opposed theright-wingpresidential candidate Abelardo de la Espriella, a former criminal defense lawyer supported by Trump, who has pledged to “disembowel the left” if he takes power in Colombia’s presidential runoff on Sunday. Petro has accused De la Espriella of being a “defender of narcoparamilitaries,” citing his legal defense of armed right-winggroups tiedto massacres, assassinations, forced displacement, and drug trafficking. In a message from detention, Coralsaidthat his arrest “is a sign of what can happen” if De la Espriella, whom he described as a “defender of mobsters and criminals,” becomes president of Colombia. According toThe New York Times, Coral’s arrest is the first known instance in which Rubio has targeted an immigrant in the US over their advocacy in a foreign election. Aaron Reichlin-Melnick, a senior fellow at the American Immigration Council,calledit an example of “free speechunder attack” by the Trump administration. “Marco Rubio just had a man arrested and jailed, and is seeking to deport him, because he publicly criticized a presidential candidate in Colombia thatDonald Trumpwould prefer to be elected,” he said, adding that Coral “committed no crimes and had an asylum application pending. ”The 40-year-old Coral was arrested after returning to his Phoenix home with his 12-year-old son. Coral had recently been in Miami, where he said he’d filed a lawsuit against De la Espriella, whom he’d previously accused of illegally recording phone calls between the two. Coral’s former partner, Tatiana Camacho, told the Times that De la Espriella had contacted Coral multiple times “so he would retract his statements. ”US Rep. Jim McGovern (D-Mass. )saidTuesday that Coral’s detention pointed to “coordination between American officials and Colombian political actors in this arrest—that would amount to our government aiding and abetting transnational repression. ”McGovern noted that he had helped leadlegislationcosponsored by Rubio in 2023 to counter transnational political repression while Rubio was still a senator. “Now he’s abetting it himself,” McGovern said, “by weaponizing the law to punish free speech and help Trump’s right-wing buddies. ”A Friday post from Coral’s X accountstatedthat he had recently been transferred between facilities by immigration authorities, that his family does not know his current whereabouts, as his name no longer appears in the official ICE locator system. On Saturday, Petrosaidhe “demands” that Trump “tell the people of Colombia where [Beto] Coral is,”referringto him in another post as a “political prisoner. ”“Solely because of the political support that US Secretary of State Marco Rubio gave to Abelardo de la Espriella, a defender of the genocidal narcoparamilitary forces against the Colombian people, who suggested his capture, he has been detained and beaten by the US government, separating him from his family,” Petro said. “[Beto] Coral sought asylum in the US because drug trafficking mafias could have murdered him 10 years ago, and the anti-migrant attitude toward South Americans has not even allowed for his authorization. ”“What will the members of Colombia’s Public Force—which carries out the world’s largest cocaine seizures—think if the states that benefit from them reject andtortureeven the sons of those fallen in combat against drug trafficking?” Petro asked. He continued: “I request thesolidarityof the governments of the world and the world’shuman rightsorganizations to free the prisoner of conscience [Beto] Coral. ”