BOGOTA (Dispatches) -- Colombia’s first leftist president after a century of right-wing rule, Gustavo Petro, has praised Iran’s Lieutenant General Qassem Soleimani and excoriated the U.S. for supporting “the worst of the Middle East”. “Soleimani was the architect of the defeat of ISIS (Daesh),” he tweeted in January 2020. Petro also credited General Soleimani for “achieving victory over a great enemy of democracy.” The U.S., however, showed its appreciation of Soleimani’s counter-terrorism genius and success “by assassinating him,” the tweet read.