MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Uruguay finds successor for Deputy Foreign Minister post

Albertoni said he had known President Lacalle for quite a while now

Although President Luis Lacalle Pou said that it would take a while to find a replacement for Carolina Ache Batlle as Deputy Foreign Minister, the Ciudadanos faction of Uruguay's Colorado Party has already come up with the name of Nicolás Albertoni for the post.

Ache resigned Monday amid the scandalous issuance of an Uruguayan passport to well-known drug trafficker Sebastián Marset.

Read also: Uruguayan Deputy Foreign Minister resigns over passport issuance scandal

Albertoni's proposal has been accepted by Lacalle Pou, it was reported in Montevideo.

The new Deputy Foreign Minister is 35 years old, from Salto. He moved to the Uruguayan capital at the age of 18 to study at the University, where he obtained a PhD in Political Science and International Relations. Later in his life, he settled in the United States to further pursue his studies.

“The role [of Deputy Foreign Minister] in itself is an enormous challenge,” Albertoni said. “I value the trust given and naturally because of the role it implies for the country it is a double responsibility,” he added.

“I believe that it is a position of immense relevance for our party and here I come in some way as a human resource of the Colorado Party at the service of the coalition,” he also pointed out,

while thanking the Ciudadanos group for its support.

“Both from the political point of view, I value the trust given to me, and naturally, due to the role it implies for the country, it is a double responsibility,” Albertoni went on.

He also admitted he had been in contact with Foreign Minister Francisco Bustillo through “an informal call, but, obviously, in these days we will see how everything will be formalized.”

Albertoni also said he had spoken with President Lacalle, whom he “has known for a long time” and is “also close to these issues because it is known, in some way, that I have had a public opinion in my defense of this vision of openness to the world.”