Overview

• State Department officials announced the revocation on X, calling Petro’s street remarks in New York “imprudent and incendiary” for urging U.S. soldiers to disobey orders.
• At the protest outside the U.N., Petro promoted a multinational “army of salvation” to defend Palestinians, saying it should be larger than the U.S. force and pledging to open volunteer enlistments.
• Back in Bogotá, Petro said the move breaks U.N. immunity norms, suggested the U.N. should no longer sit in New York, and downplayed the impact by noting he could travel under ESTA due to European citizenship.
• Colombia’s interior minister, Armando Benedetti, condemned the U.S. decision and argued the visa should have been revoked from Israel’s Benjamin Netanyahu instead.
• The decision intensifies already strained U.S.–Colombia relations after embassy recalls and Washington’s recent counternarcotics decertification, while foreign backing for Petro’s force proposal remains limited, with Indonesia cited.