Colombian President Gustavo Petro and his Venezuelan counterpart Delcy Rodriguez agreed intelligence-sharing measures to combat crime on their shared border at a meeting on Friday (April 24), as well as increases in trade and bilateral efforts to ensure electricity provision to western Venezuela, which suffers frequent black-outs.

Both leaders have come under intense pressure from U.S. President Donald Trump, in Rodriguez's case to open her country's economy to foreign investment and in Petro's to do more to combat drug trafficking.

The meeting at the presidential palace in Caracas was Rodriguez's second with a fellow head of state, after she traveled briefly to Grenada earlier this month.

Colombia and Venezuela have deep historical and cultural ties, especially along their shared 2,200-kilometer (1,370-mile) border, where many families are bi-national. Nearly 3 million Venezuelan migrants have settled in Colombia in recent years, fleeing economic collapse in their home country.

Though the border region is a hub for more than $1 billion in annual trade, it is also home to drug trafficking, smuggling and other illegal activity carried out by armed groups including criminal gangs and Colombian guerrilla organizations.

DESCRIPCIÓN DE IMÁGENES

CARACAS, VENEZUELA (APRIL 24, 2026) (REUTERS – Access all)

1. VARIOUS OF VENEZUELAN INTERIM PRESIDENT, DELCY RODRIGUEZ, WITH COLOMBIAN PRESIDENT, GUSTAVO PETRO

2. COLOMBIAN DELEGATION AT THE MEETING

3. PETRO

4. VENEZUELAN DELEGATION AT THE MEETING

5. RODRIGUEZ

6. MEETING IN PROGRESS

7. FOREIGN MINISTER OF COLOMBIA, ROSA VILLAVICENCIO, AND VENEZUELAN COUNTERPART, YVAN GIL, SHAKING HANDS AND SHOWING SIGNED AGREEMENTS

8. (SOUNDBITE) (Spanish) VENEZUELAN INTERIM PRESIDENT, DELCY RODRIGUEZ, SAYING:

"We have undertaken a very serious, very comprehensive approach to what the fight against criminal gangs and transnational crime groups must be. Both countries have proposed developing military plans for the territory of Colombia and the territory of Venezuela, as appropriate, but also the immediate establishment of mechanisms to share information and for the development of intelligence. These are mechanisms that must enter into force immediately. Let drug trafficking groups, groups involved in fuel smuggling and other types of smuggling, know that we are taking firm steps to combat these crimes."

9. PRESS CONFERENCE IN PROGRESS

10. (SOUNDBITE) (Spanish) VENEZUELAN INTERIM PRESIDENT, DELCY RODRIGUEZ, SAYING:

"We have also discussed the electricity interconnection for western Venezuela, which is so important at this time, as the west of the country well knows, but also the Venezuelan people, who are suffering from what has been the process of underinvestment in the national electricity system as a result, well, of sanctions that have directly affected the supply of spare parts and maintenance for our national electricity system. So the electricity interconnection is now just one step away, as is the gas interconnection, through which we may not only send gas to Colombia but also jointly export gas to other countries."

11. PRESS CONFERENCE IN PROGRESS

12. (SOUNDBITE) (Spanish) COLOMBIAN PRESIDENT, GUSTAVO PETRO, SAYING:

"And let energy integration be guaranteed, as President Delcy has just said here, hopefully through the new forms of energy and not the old ones. The old forms of energy tend to bring violence to the world, genocides in the world, missiles, authoritarianisms. The new forms of energy, which I am trying to promote in my own country, can bring peace; they can help build a global democracy, a brotherly humanity.”

13. PRESS CONFERENCE IN PROGRESS

14. (SOUNDBITE) (Spanish) COLOMBIAN PRESIDENT, GUSTAVO PETRO, SAYING:

"To configure a deep, coordinated common effort to free the peoples of the border from the mafias engaged in various illegal economies, beginning with cocaine, illicit gold, human trafficking and other types of rare minerals, etc. In such a way that the border belongs only to the people, the Colombian people, the Venezuelan people. The border cannot belong to anyone other than the peoples."

15. PRESIDENTS AT END OF PRESS CONFERENCE

16. PRESIDENTS HUGGING AND KISSING

17. VEHICLE IN FRONT OF PALACE

18. RODRIGUEZ AT END OF EVENT