A letter addressed to: Gustavo Petro Urrego – President of Colombia, Donald Trump – President of the United States of America

From: Luis Alfonso Escobar Jaramillo – Governor of Nariño

Mr. Presidents,

On February 3, 2026, the world will witness a meeting between two figures who have redefined the exercise of power in the 21st century. You, who have been able to interpret the deepest sentiments of your nations and challenge traditional frameworks of governance, now face an opportunity reserved by history for true leaders: to consolidate a model of peace that a world immersed in uncertainty urgently demands.

I write to you from Nariño, in southern Colombia. A territory that, unlike other global flashpoints, does not seek confrontation or isolation. Nariño is neither Venezuela nor Palestine; here there are no insurmountable walls nor irreconcilable ideological divides. We are a living hinge: the point where the hemispheric security of the North and the social justice of the South cease to be competing concepts and become a single will for transformation. This is, in essence, what each of you seeks and explores according to your individual convictions, yet converges in the shared pursuit not of a common enemy, but of a greater and global purpose.

The greatness of leadership is measured by the ability to transform adverse realities into tangible victories. Today, you hold in your hands the “Nariño Model,” a pragmatic demonstration that your visions, far from excluding one another, are mutually necessary.

Here, in this southern land, in these five worlds that make up a subnational state within Colombia, we have reduced the homicide rate from 26.3 to 16.3 per 100,000 inhabitants in just two years. In 2025, we reached zero terrorist actions. President Trump, this is the language of law and security; President Petro, this is the fruit of social dialogue that took root in Nariño during your administration.

Facts speak for our determination. Tumaco, on Colombia’s Pacific coast, was for 35 years classified as the territory with the largest number of hectares planted with coca. Today, through joint governmental, institutional, and community actions, it is advancing in the voluntary eradication of 2,800 hectares of coca. In doing so, we are returning land ownership to small farmers and ensuring that the District of Tumaco no longer occupies the first place in illicit crop cultivation. This is how we eradicate, substitute, formalize, and title.

Mr. Presidents, this letter is a plea for the protection of life. Under no circumstances does Nariño deserve to be dragged back into the past. The communities of this region of Colombia have chosen not to be part of a tragic destiny. We firmly refuse to repeat the pain and shadows experienced before 2023—especially now that investment is reaching the entire territory historically affected by war and suffering, through road infrastructure, strategic connectivity nodes, the expansion of higher education in the regions, and programs for health, water, and basic sanitation.

Today, the Regional Peace Dialogues taking place in Nariño are advancing with unprecedented determination, delivering concrete results: humanitarian agreements, a reduction in child recruitment, the destruction of war material, the discovery of persons previously reported missing, broad social investment, resource mobilization for territorial transformation, and the commitment of communities to substitute 20,000 hectares of coca with legal crops, among other achievements that attest to the social dialogue model implemented. Any breakdown of these processes, or a lack of understanding between your strategic visions, would not only represent a diplomatic setback, but would also mean an escalation of violence that our mountains and coasts can no longer endure. The path we have chosen, as a country and as a region, is to seek solutions and alternatives that reduce conflict, not fuel it.

For this reason, I urge you to consider Nariño as the setting where the national security of the United States and Colombia’s social transformation can come together through friendly, humane, and ethical cooperation. If we succeed in making this territory exemplary, you will have shown the world that a middle path exists—one where the technology and strength of the North unite with the resilience and richness of the South.

Imagine the legacy: a secure border corridor, a thriving legal economy, and a drastic reduction in the flow of drugs to the North—not solely through the force of order, but through the power of prosperity. If Nariño becomes that exemplary territory, the world will look to February 3 as the moment when two visionary leaders chose to write a new grammar for global peace.

I propose transforming Nariño into a “Confidence-Building Scenario,” through a pilot plan that includes strategic investment in the Port of Tumaco, mining formalization, and the promotion of the energy transition so that legality becomes more profitable than crime. This would be complemented by rapid-response projects—schools, collection centers, health posts, and investment in entrepreneurship—in border conflict zones to rebuild what war has destroyed.

In Nariño, we are ready for international investment, carbon credits, and shared security to turn this corner of the Americas into a beacon of a new era for territorial peace under conditions of security and social transformation. Statesmen are known by the wars they prevent and the nations they build. In Nariño, the table is set for your greatest political victory. Do not allow the hope of a people who have already chosen peace to be betrayed.

With profound admiration,

Luis Alfonso Escobar Jaramillo
Governor of the Department of Nariño