Thank you.
Mr. Ambassador, it's always an honour to have an ambassador come before our committee to talk about his country and the benefits and the values that are changing, particularly in Colombia.
I had the opportunity a little over a year ago to visit your country. I was in Medellin, and it was incredible. When we went to the hotel, we looked around for security. We looked around for all the things that we had been told about not many years before. I was told that, two years before, if we had come to this hotel, there would have been armed guards in front of it. For those few days that we were there, we had an opportunity to talk about our free trade agreement. And we never saw one armed guard. I give credit to your country for taking hold of something. They had tried to brand Colombia as a country of high crime and high violence. You've been able to grasp that and deal with it in a very positive manner. I congratulate you on that.
One of the things Canada is doing, and wants to do, is to have a presence in Latin America. The Pacific Alliance of the four countries, Colombia, Chile, Peru, and Mexico are the ones that we're talking about right now. I wouldn't mind getting your opinion of Canada's becoming part of the Pacific Alliance. This would make Canada more visible in Latin America. Do you see this as a benefit to Canada?