CALI (AFP) — Colombia’s leftist President Gustavo Petro accused the United States and “right-wing extremists” on Wednesday of plotting to overthrow him as the country reeled from a wave of violence.

He echoed remarks by Venezuelan leader Nicolas Maduro, who has accused US Secretary of State Marco Rubio of leading a coup attempt against Petro in order to “fill all of Colombia with criminal gangs.”

“A neighboring president is saying that Marco Rubio is plotting a coup against me,” Petro told a rally in Cali, the country’s third-largest city.

The Colombian leader, who took office in August 2022, posted online earlier that “right-wing extremists in Colombia and the United States” were in regular contact to discuss ousting him.

He claimed a far-right “leader” had spoken to Rubio, without providing further details.

Colombia is in the throes of its biggest security crisis in a decade ahead of next year’s presidential elections.

The Latin American country was rocked by a string of coordinated bomb and gun attacks on Tuesday that killed at least seven people in and around Cali.

The attacks came days after right-wing opposition Senator Miguel Uribe, a presidential candidate, was shot in the head while campaigning in the capital Bogota in a brazen assassination attempt that has put Colombia on edge.

Rubio said in a scathing attack on Petro that the shooting was “the result of the violent leftist rhetoric coming from the highest levels of the Colombian government.”

Colombia was until recently one of the United States’ closest partners in Latin America.

But Petro’s crossing swords with his US counterpart Donald Trump over issues such as deportation flights and trade with China has put relations on ice.