President Diaz-Canel receives his Colombian counterpart Gustavo Petro

Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel Bermúdez welcomed President Gustavo Petro on Friday afternoon at the Palace of the Revolution.

"We ratify that for us it is a great satisfaction that you are here and also the results of the negotiations" The Cuban leader said, "We ratify that it is a great satisfaction for us that you are here and also the results of the negotiations" of the Third Cycle of the Peace Dialogue Table between the Government of Colombia and the National Liberation Army (ELN).

After the presentation and signing of the partial agreements between the Colombian government and the guerrilla as a result of the peace negotiations - signatures that were stamped in the Cubanacan Protocol Hall of the El Laguito complex, Miramar - the Head of State of the South American country went to the headquarters of the Presidency of the Republic of Cuba.

Díaz-Canel praised Petro's special contribution to peace, who upon assuming the presidency -he said- revitalized the path towards negotiations with the ELN, which had been interrupted by the previous government, and to peace in Colombia.

The Antillean President also thanked his colleague, because upon taking office, he immediately rejected the inclusion of Cuba in the spurious list of the US government on alleged countries that sponsor terrorism and demanded the lifting of the blockade.

Petro - remarked Díaz-Canel - defended Cuba's principled position of respecting the agreements it assumed as guarantor of the dialogue process.

With that position, you left without arguments those who used Cuba's respect for those commitments to attack it, said Díaz-Canel, referring to the fact that the permanence of ELN negotiators in Havana - whom the former Colombian government demanded to be extradited against the agreements - was the justification used by the government of Donald Trump to include Cuba in the spurious list a few days before leaving office.

We also note the willingness to strengthen bilateral relations and promote cultural, economic, commercial and cooperation ties, the Cuban head of government wrote on his Twitter account.

The reception of President Petro was attended, on the Colombian side, by Álvaro Leyva Durán, Foreign Minister; José Otty Patiño, head of the Colombian government delegation to the peace talks, and Danilo Rueda, High Commissioner for Peace.

The Cuban side was represented by the member of the Political Bureau of the Central Committee of the Party and Minister of Foreign Affairs, Bruno Rodríguez Parrilla; Deputy Foreign Minister Josefina Vidal Ferreriro, and the Cuban Ambassador to Colombia, Javier Caamaño Cairo.