Report From the Progressive International's Nuestra Summit

""Don't go!" more than one voice could be heard shouting in the packed Teatro Colón on January 24. The plea was in response to Colombian senator María José Pizarro Rodríguez's declaration that Colombia's President Gustavo Petro would be traveling to the White House on February 3 "in an act of courage." While the popular Pacto Histórico senator was mostly met with cheers and chants of the Chilean protest song, " El pueblo unido jamás será vencido,""

""The bombing of Caracas made the threat of military intervention in Colombia feel more materially possible than we'd ever imagined," Esteban Romero, a 27-year-old political scientist and local activist, told The Nation. Pizarro spoke as part of the Progressive International's "Nuestra América" summit during which 90 delegates from 20 countries discussed the Trump administration's increasingly belligerent threats to a region treated as the United States' "backyard" since the original Monroe Doctrine was issued."

Packed crowds in Bogotá reacted with both pleas and chants when a senator announced President Gustavo Petro's planned White House visit, revealing deep unease about U.S. intentions after a reported abduction of Venezuela's leaders. Activists and political scientists described recent violence in Caracas as making military intervention in the region feel more materially possible. Delegates from 20 countries gathered at a regional summit to confront escalating U.S. belligerence and to coordinate left-wing responses. Colombian government officials hosted international delegates at the San Carlos Palace, signaling a concerted leftist effort to challenge historical U.S. interventionism and contemporary aggressive policies.

Read at The Nation