Hopeful Signs For A Colombia Free-Trade Pact

Colombia asserted itself on the international stage last week, with the 50th annual governors' meeting of the Inter-American Development Bank in Medellin. Some 6,000 bankers and businesspeople came.

All spruced up for the meeting, Medellin did its best to reclaim its identity as a great industrial center in the Americas, erasing the terrible image it once had as center of the global drug trade. Looking at the graceful, Hong Kong-like skyline amid flowers and greenery, it's hard to believe Medellin ever had such a past.

Corporate titans from Brazil, Spain, Japan, China and Germany were present along with the bankers, having invested $8.5 billion in Colombia in 2008.

It isn't surprising, because Colombia is rapidly moving to diversify its trading partners, signing deals with China, Japan, Korea, the European Union, Canada and Central America, following Chile's model of signing free-trade deals with all comers.

The U.S., with its Colombia free-trade agreement still on ice in Congress, was the only country that looked isolated and out of tune with the world without its pact...

[That would be our staunchest ally in South America. Humiliating.]

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