Latin Leaders to Meet with Trump at Davos Forum

Ecuador's President Daniel Noboa, who also extends a hand to Trump with similar crime-fighting policies, leads a large delegation including four ministers, namely Foreign Minister Gabriela Sommerfeld and Economy Minister Sariha Moya. Meanwhile, Colombian President Gustavo Petro, initially expected to attend, canceled his participation to prioritize his upcoming February 3rd meeting with Trump at the White House. This meeting is expected to mend the tense relations between the two leaders, which escalated further following the U.S. arrest of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and threats to do the same in Colombia. Argentine President Javier Milei, Ecuador's Daniel Noboa, and Panama's José Raúl Mulino are the Latin American leaders attending the World Economic Forum (WEF) in Davos, Switzerland, which begins this Monday. The three conservative leaders will meet in Switzerland with the largest U.S. delegation in the forum's history, led by Donald Trump, who will be accompanied by at least five members of his administration. Mexico's President Claudia Sheinbaum, another face of Latin American progressivism, has also faced Trump's threats of military operations in her country under the pretext of combating drug trafficking. Sheinbaum will not travel to Davos; instead, Secretary of the Environment and Natural Resources Alicia Bárcena will head Mexico's delegation. Bolivian President Rodrigo Paz also canceled his Davos trip, despite it being his first international visit as president, to 'prioritize the national agenda.' Milei, a key Trump ally in the region, will be accompanied by his cabinet's top brass—General Secretary of the Presidency and his sister Karina Milei, Economy Minister Luis Caputo, and Foreign Minister Pablo Quirno—to a forum where he last year stood out for his fiery speech against the left and what he called the 'mental virus of woke ideology.' The situation in Venezuela and the future of its oil economy, which the U.S. now seeks to control, is one of the conflicts on the table in Davos, alongside Trump's tariff threats against Europe for opposing the U.S. annexation of Greenland. The event, running until next Friday, takes place 'in the most complex geopolitical context since 1945,' said WEF President Borge Brende this week. Noboa's departure would temporarily hand power to Vice President Edmand Lara, a former police officer with whom he has marked differences, to the point that Lara has declared himself 'constructive opposition.'