Juan Manuel Santos Quotes

One doesn't make peace with one's friends. One makes peace with one's enemies.

We must rebuild Colombia, starting with ourselves, our hearts, put resentment aside, put hatred aside, put envy aside. The only thing that those attitudes accomplish is to sow violence and sow death and suffering.

Where do you draw the line between peace and justice? If you ask the victims, they want more justice; if you ask the potential victims, they want more peace.

My generation has not seen one single day of peace, and my dream is for my children and the children of all Colombians to have the change to see it. I hope the guerrilla understands that the time has come to leave this 50-year confrontation behind; that the time has come to change from bullets to votes, from weapons to argumentations; that the time has come for them to continue their struggle, but within democracy.

To make peace, it is necessary to know how to make war.

Waging war is much more popular than negotiating, because there you need to compromise.

The rebels will be thinking about retaliation, what we have to do is stop; stop and transform it into a spiral of forgiveness and reconciliation.

Today, we must acknowledge, that war has not been won.

I practice Transcendental Meditation and I had enough exercise. I am one who thinks that not only need to have patience, we must persevere. If you do it right you'll see results.

Ten years ago, we were seen as a virtually failed state, but today we are a vibrant democracy. You can walk safely through the streets of Bogota these days.

Social housing, education, health, jobs and sustainable surroundings. Those are my priorities.

More than 70 percent of Colombians want peace. The rest are afraid of the price to be paid. But even they will realize that their worst fears will not come true. I'm quite optimistic that Colombians do back an agreement with the FARC.

I remember in 2000, when President Clinton came to Cartagena just before Plan Colombia started, the country was on the verge of becoming a failed state. Today, we are one of the most solid democracies, where institutions are working, where the scandals such as false positives have come to light because of those functioning institutions.

Colombia is a different country today. The state is now present in every single corner, the drug lords are in jail or dead. So we have the means to guarantee the security of FARC politicians.

I want to see Colombian youth become the best-educated in Latin America by 2025.

Uribe and I have very good relations. I owe him loyalty, I admire him, he did great things for our country, and I think that because of what he did, I can now concentrate on different issues, different from what he concentrated on.

I've not lived one single day of peace in Colombia, and 90 percent of people here say the same thing. We have gotten used to living in a war - we don't even react to massacres.

A Colombia without coca and without conflict was an impossible dream just a few years or decades ago, and today I can tell you it is a real possibility. Just imagine it. We have already begun discussion of the last two substantive points: victims and the end of the conflict.

Colombians do not like the FARC. In fact, 95 percent reject the FARC.

Democracy is like three oxen pulling a plough. The oxen are the independent powers, but you have to walk in the same direction; otherwise, you cannot plough and that is what was happening in Colombia. One ox was walking in one direction, the other in another direction, so the democracy was not working.

If we act together on the drug problem, with a comprehensive vision devoid of ideological or political biases, we will be able to prevent much harm and violence!

It was shameful that, after Haiti, Colombia was the second most unequal country in Latin America. But we've achieved some things; the inequality is coming down, and coming down fast. The growing economy has provided us with the funds to finance a very progressive social policy that has reduced extreme poverty. We have the lowest inflation rate of all Latin-America countries and the highest growth rate.

I say this as the president of the country which has suffered more deaths, more blood and more sacrifices in this war.

Colombia has a huge variety of plant and animal species, and we have enormous potential. Small and mid-sized companies should come to Colombia. From here, they have access to the entire Latin American market.

Europe would be well advised to pay more attention to Latin America. The emerging economies are the engines of the global economy. Colombia has done too little to improve its reputation in Europe.