Colombia and Ecuador on Friday appointed mediators to take control of negotiating diplomatic relations between the two countries – broken since March 2008.
Colombia’s Foreign Ministry has appointed Ricardo Montenegro Coral, currently director of the Office of Territorial Sovereignty and Border Development, as the new Charge d’Affaires for negotiating a solution to the crisis in diplomatic relations between the countries, reported Colombian media Friday.
The Charge d’Affaires is the highest ranking official within a diplomatic mission who replaces the Ambassador or Chief of Mission in his absence.
Montenegro’s Ecuadorian counterpart is Andres Teran. The Foreign Ministers for both countries, Fander Falconi and Jaime Bermudez, decided to release the names of the two new officials simultaneously on Friday.
Montenegro is a Social Communicator – a Journalist for the University Los Libertadores who specializes in Public Land Management of the External University of Colombia. He is an expert on integration and border development, with 14 years experience.
In 2008 Montenegro was President Pro Tempore of the High Level Group for border integration and development in the Andean Community.
Teran is a Doctor of Jurisprudence with a long diplomatic career in which he ranked as a Minister of Foreign Service.
Teran, according to Falconi, is due to travel to Colombia in the next ten days to begin disucssing the restoration of relations which were broken by Ecuador in March 2008 after Colombian military conducted a bombardment of a FARC guerrilla camp on Ecuadorian soil without informing Ecuadorian authorities.