MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Argentina recalls Ambassador in Montevideo due to “service reasons”

García Moritán had been appointed in February last year under then-Foreign Minister Diana Mondino

Ambassador Martín García Moritán has been removed from the Argentine mission in the Uruguayan capital and ordered back to Buenos Aires, according to Presidential Decree 29/2025 published Wednesday in the Official Gazette. The measure was adopted barely over a month before President-elect Yamandú Orsi's March 1 inauguration. The career diplomat had been appointed on Feb. 19, 2024.

With no successor in sight, the Libertarian administration of Javier Milei is expected to choose carefully the next ambassador. Pursuant to the presidential decree, García Moritán is to return to the San Martín Palace (Foreign Ministry headquarters).

García Moritán has a law degree from the University of Buenos Aires and became a career diplomat in 1983. He served in the Special Mission to the Holy See during the Argentine-Chilean Beagle border conflict (1984) and in the diplomatic representations of the Federative Republic of Brazil (1987-92), in Bolivia (1993-94), Mission of the Argentine Republic to the United Nations (1994-97), Consul in Recife, Federative Republic of Brazil (1997-99), Mission of the Argentine Republic to the United Nations (2003-09) and General Commissioner of the Argentine Pavilion at the 2010 Shanghai World Exhibition, among other posts.

According to Buenos Aires media, Foreign Minister Gerardo Wertehin is reshaping his office after taking over from Diana Mondino, who was sacked by Milei on Oct. 31, 2024, for failing to conduct businesses in line with Libertarian guidelines.

While Milei hoped to align Buenos Aires with Washington and Tel Aviv and against Venezuela, Cuba, and Nicaragua, Argentina endorsed a UN document drafted by Havana defending “the sovereign equality of States, non-intervention and non-interference in their internal affairs and the freedom of international trade and navigation, enshrined in numerous international legal instruments,” which prompted Mondino's departure. It is only natural that those officials appointed by her are gradually removed from their positions, a diplomatic source in the Argentine capital explained.