U.S. tells Bolivia to "knock it off"
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United States on Thursday told Bolivia to "knock it off" and stop leveling "unfounded" accusations against Washington's ambassador there.
Bolivian officials have in recent months launched a string of accusations against the U.S. ambassador, Philip Goldberg, including claims he was involved in a conspiracy to overthrow the government of leftist President Evo Morales.
"The basic message is, just stop it. Knock it off," said State Department spokesman Sean McCormack.
McCormack said the Bolivian ambassador to the United States, Gustavo Guzman, was called in last Friday to meet principal Deputy Assistant Secretary Craig Kelly at the State Department to discuss allegations made against Goldberg.
"The allegations are untrue, unfounded and they are not helpful in nurturing relations between the U.S. and Bolivia," McCormack told reporters.
The spat stems from a photograph in which Goldberg and a businessman from the eastern province of Santa Cruz, a bastion of the rightist opposition, appear with a third person, Jhon Jairo Vanegas, who the Morales government says is a Colombian criminal.
"I cannot understand this photograph with a Colombian paramilitary and this is an open conspiracy," Morales said in a speech to Latin American heads of state in Chile last week.
Guzman, Bolivia's ambassador in Washington, said he and Kelly briefly discussed the allegations against Goldberg last Friday, but he described the encounter as a "courtesy visit" and not a summons from the State Department.
"As of today, Thursday the 15th, I'm still waiting for the State Department to call for a meeting to talk about the picture," he told Reuters by telephone.
The stand-off follows months of bickering between the two countries.
In August, Bolivian Vice President Alvaro Garcia Linera said U.S. aid was being used to finance a think tank where opposition leaders were orchestrating a campaign against Morales' leftist government.
The United States strongly rejected the allegations.
Last month, Goldberg was summoned by Bolivia's Foreign Minister David Choquehuanca to apologize for remarks about Morales.
Goldberg had joked that Morales -- who had suggested the United Nations headquarters should be moved outside the United States -- may also want to move the Walt Disney World theme park to another country.
Goldberg, a career foreign service officer with postings in Africa, Europe and Latin America, has been U.S. ambassador to Bolivia since October 2006.
(Reporting by Sue Pleming; Additional reporting by Eduardo Garcia in La Paz; Editing by John O'Callaghan)
