The Diplomat
The Foreign Affairs Committee of the Congress on Thursday backed the legitimacy of the Peruvian government led by leftist Pedro Castillo, following the controversy sparked by the recent appearance of the president of the Peruvian Congress, María del Carmen Alva, in the Spanish Lower House.
Alva spoke with a delegation from her country in the Foreign Affairs Committee, and according to sources from Unidas Podemos, PSOE and JxCAT, the Peruvian delegation’s intervention was surprising for its “exalted” tone and for “delegitimising” some of Castillo’s government ministers.
Members of parliament from these parties present at the meeting told Efe that Alva linked the country’s poor economic situation to the policies of recent Peruvian governments made up of “terrorists and criminals” and warned that Castillo’s government could be preparing a “self-coup” since the president frequently meets “with the armed forces”.
Alva’s remarks and an intervention by Unidas Podemos MP Antón Gómez-Reino, who was critical of Alva, prompted the president of the Peruvian Congress’s Foreign Affairs Committee, Ernesto Bustamante, to send a letter to the president of the Spanish Foreign Affairs Committee, Pau Marí-Klose, accusing the MP from the purple party of meddling in Peru’s internal affairs. The incident also caused an institutional crisis in the Latin American country.
Following the controversy, Podemos presented an initiative before the Foreign Affairs Committee of the Spanish Congress with the aim of supporting the Peruvian government and urging it to respect the will of the people as expressed democratically at the ballot box.
In defence of the proposal, Podemos MP Lucía Muñoz said: “The elections in Peru were clean, and we are not saying this ourselves, but the international observers rejected the accusation of fraud that began from minute one”. Peru,” she added, “is a brother country with which we have a deep relationship of friendship and cooperation, so we at Unidas Podemos want to express our deep support for the will of the people and the democratically elected government headed by President Pedro Castillo.
The initiative was approved with the backing of the Socialist Party and its supporters in Parliament, including Bildu and ERC. The Popular Party and Vox were against.
People’s Party MP Carlos Rojas accused Unidas Podemos of “lashing out” against the Peruvian congressional delegation that visited Spain and of contributing to the consolidation in Peru of “a government of the extreme left, which would change the country’s constitution and chronicle the system that already exists in Venezuela, Cuba and Nicaragua”.
“We want to express our support for the president of the Peruvian Congress in the exercise of her legitimate functions and ask the government of her country to respect the functioning of Congress and the separation of powers,” Rojas remarked.
He also called on Unidas Podemos to “stop trying to destroy the remaining democracies in Latin America and to stop being the hand that rocks the cradle of Bolivarian totalitarianism”.
