Word: betancur
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Dates: during 1982-1982
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During a five-hour stopover in Bogota, Reagan met with quasi-Populist President Belisario Betancur at his official residence, Narifto House. Betancur took office last August and has already symbolically yanked foreign policy away from unquestioning fealty to Washington, most notably with a proposal that Colombia join the Non-aligned Movement, a largely Third World group...
...Betancur certainly sounded nonaligned. Even his public remarks at lunch with Reagan, after their 45-minute private talk, were harsh. He said that Colombian products are denied full access to the U.S. market by tariffs, that the U.S. should prod the IMF to lend more money more easily to countries like his, and that industrialized powers generally renege on their vague, rosy promises to help developing countries. Alluding to the unaccommodating U.S. attitude toward Marxist Nicaragua, Betancur said that hemispheric interests are ill served "either by pressure or isolation." Reagan did not reply in kind. His speech, muted and conciliatory...