The Colombian president has denied any connection with Colombia's "smuggling czar", currently detained in Portugal, who contributed a large amount of money to Gustavo Petro's 2022 election campaign.
On Sunday, Colombian magazine Cambio revealed that Diego Marín, known as "Papa Smurf" or "Smurf", donated 500 million pesos (about 117 thousand euros) to Petro's presidential campaign.
Other media outlets said Petro and the new head of the presidential cabinet, former ambassador Armando Benedetti, met with Marín in Spain in January 2022.
"I must declare that there was never a meeting with Benedetti, Diego Marín and myself in Madrid, Spain, as some media outlets suggest," the head of state assured on the social network X.
"There was only one public event with hundreds of Colombians in the public auditorium of the Spanish union UGT, which was publicly convened and in which I only spoke giving a talk," added Petro, who is visiting Dubai.
Petro admitted that he only saw Marín "once", when he was introduced "along with other gentlemen as a businessman from Sanandresito", as the companies in Colombia that originally sold imported products tax-free because they entered the country through the island of San Andrés are known.
"I explained to him, without knowing who I was, that my policy consisted of transforming the areas of San Andrés from spaces of contraband into spaces of national production. He did not offer any money for the campaign while I was there," Petro added.
At that meeting, Petro added, was also the Catalan businessman and politician Xavier Vendrell, who was the one who received a folder with the money contributed by Marín, at the beginning of 2022.
The president said he ordered the money to be returned some time later, when he became aware of the origin of the contribution.
At the end of January, Petro requested the extradition of Marín, who was arrested in December in northern Portugal after fleeing Spain.
Colombian authorities want to charge Marín with smuggling, bribery and participation in a criminal organization.
The alleged connection with Marín came at a time when Petro is facing a political crisis, after, on Sunday, asking for the resignation of all ministers and other senior administration officials.
This comes five days after a six-hour cabinet meeting broadcast on television and social media, during which Petro and several government members accused and berated each other for management failures.
Also at issue was the appointment of Benedetti as head of the presidential cabinet.
Benedetti, also a former senator, was the target of several corruption cases and was involved in a domestic violence scandal in the past.
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