Colombia-Venezuela Summit Canceled After Trump-Petro Phone Call

A planned Friday meeting between Colombian President Gustavo Petro and Venezuelan acting President Delcy Rodriguez was called off Thursday, according to a source inside Petro's office who spoke to Reuters. Both governments are working to find a new date, though no reason for the cancellation was officially provided.

The scrapped summit came shortly after Petro and U.S. President Donald Trump held a phone call, during which Trump wished Petro well ahead of the planned bilateral. The high-level talks would have marked Rodriguez's first in-person presidential meeting since she assumed power following the removal of former Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro by U.S. forces in January — a transition that Washington has backed and publicly praised.

Border economic issues were expected to dominate the agenda between Petro and Rodriguez. Those same concerns also featured prominently in the Trump-Petro conversation, alongside topics including energy, hydrocarbons, drug trafficking, and illicit crop eradication. Trump, who previously imposed sanctions on Petro and excluded him from a Miami summit with other Latin American leaders last week, reportedly apologized for the oversight and reaffirmed that Petro remains welcome in the United States.

Petro, in turn, extended a personal invitation for Trump to visit Cartagena — an offer Trump reportedly received warmly, according to a statement from the Colombian presidency.

Relations between Bogotá and Washington have been turbulent. Trump has repeatedly accused Petro, without evidence, of ties to drug trafficking, while Petro has criticized U.S. anti-drug operations as potentially constituting war crimes. Despite this friction, both leaders described their recent face-to-face meeting in Washington last month in positive terms.

Rodriguez's government did not immediately respond to media inquiries about the canceled meeting, leaving the diplomatic path between Caracas and Bogotá temporarily on hold.