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WASHINGTON-The United States should ratify the stalled free-trade agreement with Colombia this year as well as approve an 18-month extension of the Andean Trade Preference Act and continue support for Plan Colombia, Colombian Vice President Angelino Garzón said Wednesday during a weeklong visit to Washington in support of those objectives.

If any country doesn’t ratify a free-trade agreement, “relations will not deteriorate, we will remain friends, but commerce and business relations will move,” Garzón said at the National Press Club. Garzón has been meeting with members of Congress, union leaders and government officials, including U.S. Trade Representative Ron Kirk and Rep. Sander Levin (D-Mich.), to bolster approval for the stalled FTA. He is scheduled to meet with Vice President Joe Biden and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Friday.

Garzón expressed confidence that the agreement, which was originally signed in 2006 but has languished in Congress alongside free trade accords with South Korea and Panama, would be signed this year, citing the support of President Barack Obama. “I made it clear that we would enforce our trade agreements, and that I would only sign deals that keep faith with American workers and promote American jobs. That’s what we did with Korea, and that’s what I intend to do as we pursue agreements with Panama and Colombia,” Obama said Tuesday in the annual State of the Union address.

Garzón echoed the notion that the agreement was “not a handout” to Colombia, but rather a “win-win situation” that would promote economic growth and reduce unemployment in both countries. Nonetheless, he said Colombia would continue its policy of seeking out and executing trade accords with other countries, including ratification of an agreement with the European Union and an FTA with Canada that will go into effect later this year.

One of the main criticisms from the detractors of the trade deal with Colombia is the country’s record of human rights violations. The vice president, a former labor activist, affirmed Colombia’s commitment to human and labor rights and dedication to fighting impunity. “Action against corruption is as important on a judicial and political level as the fight against criminal groups,” he said.