BOGOTA: Colombia said on Wednesday it would work with Venezuela to stem smuggling but said the nighttime closure of their common border was not a good solution.
Venezuela closed the border on Monday night for the first time to try to shut down the flow of contraband gasoline and other heavily subsidized products to Colombia.
Officials say the contraband is contributing to shortages of many basic goods in Venezuela, a huge political problem for the leftist government in Caracas.
Colombia's Foreign Minister Maria Angela Holguin acknowledged that the smuggling was a problem but said closing the 2,200 kilometer (1,367 mile) border every night between 10:00 pm and 5:00 am was not the solution.
"But it is a decision that the Venezuelan government has taken, which we hope will be temporary, and we hope that little by little the contraband will be controlled and things can return to normal," she said.
Holguin added that the border closure should not affect trade but it will make it more difficult for people who commute to work across the border.
She acknowledged, however, that shortages in Venezuela were due in part to the smuggling.
"A big part of the problem is when you subsidize all foods and the country on the other side does not subsidize, then logically you are going to have contraband," she said.
Gasoline in oil-rich Venezuela sells at the pump for less than two US cents a liter, far and away the world's cheapest.
Venezuela's President Nicolas Maduro estimates that 40 percent of the subsidized products that go into his country's distribution networks are illegally diverted to Colombia, along with about 100,000 barrels of oil a day in the form of contraband gasoline.
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