The secretary general of the Organization of American States (OAS), Luis Almagro, has once again become a fixture in the cracked political debate in the region because of his role in the Bolivian coup that overthrew Evo Morales a year ago.

The victory of Movimiento al Socialismo (MAS) candidate Luciano Arce in the October 18 presidential elections was considered the first regional victory of Argentine President Alberto Fernández and vindicated his decision to keep Morales as a political refugee, just as the Mexican government did, another winner of Evo's former minister's victory in the presidential elections.

[Evo Morales Arrives in Mexico]

It was not a position without resistance: some members of the Argentinean diplomatic corps warned that an extension of the stay of the former Bolivian president in the country would only be one more problem in the bilateral relationship with Brazil and the United States. The postponement of the election, due to the difficulties of the pandemic, only increased the questions.

That's why Arce's victory in Argentina was celebrated equally at the presidential residence and in the department of Cristina Kirchner, who soon began a campaign against Almagro, who for now has enough support to stand firm in his office in Washington.

But the Argentine vice president's onslaught would be enough to make the Cambiemos opposition coalition uncomfortable and balance the attacks of its leaders for the differences in the government's position in the face of Alberto's decision to accompany the Bachelet report on human rights violations in Nicolas Maduro's Venezuela.

It is not the first time that Cristina Kirchner has spared the Argentine president and his foreign minister international positions that complicate the relationship with the United States, whose actions or omissions will be key in the negotiation with the International Monetary Fund.

In the explosive letter she circulated Monday analyzing the government's position, Cristina Kirchner maintained that the OAS "led a coup d'état" in Bolivia, "saying that there had been fraud in last year's presidential elections. The outcome of the recent elections in that sister country exempts me from further comment," she ironically said, alluding to the fact that the political strength of Evo Morales has been restored.

Argentine Foreign Minister Felipe Solá had not been so explicit during the assembly of the organization following the Bolivian elections. "The OAS must be containment, mediation and above all, a guarantor of peace in our Latin America. Never a judge or a political gendarme. Not with personal positions and even less when they end up feeding the problem that they should help to solve", he stated that day.

This is not the first time Cristina has saved the president and the foreign minister from international positions that would complicate the relationship with the United States, whose actions or omissions will be key in the negotiation with the International Monetary Fund. Since she was in the Senate, she has been collaborating in the bilateral relationship with China, whose expansion in Latin America exasperates Donald Trump, the architect of Almagro's reelection to the OAS.

In Mexico, an Argentine ally in the fight against Almagro, they avoid half measures and suggested that he resign. That country's Undersecretary for Latin America and the Caribbean, Maximiliano Reyes, accused him of "hurting" Bolivia's democracy and of having "factitiously used the Electoral Observation Mission to denounce an alleged fraud, never proven in a premature manner".

"While you continue to lead the organization, the shadow of what happened in Bolivia will always be present," added the Mexican Foreign Ministry official, who also asked him to "submit to a process of reflection and self-criticism".

In Mexico they avoid half measures and suggested Almagro to resign. The Undersecretary for Latin America, Maximiliano Reyes, accused him of "hurting" Bolivia's democracy.

The Uruguayan, who came to lead the OAS with the support of Argentina after being Pepe Mujica's Foreign Minister, eluded the reproaches and put Venezuela back at the center of the organization with a motion of rejection to the legislative elections of December 6, not accompanied by Mexico and Argentina.

That OAS delegation to the Bolivian elections of October 20, 2019 had a particularity: the almost departing government of Macri opened it to political parties and thus the Argentine representatives turned out to be the Kirchnerists Santiago Eguren and Gerónimo Ustarroz, later labeled as "spies" by Almagro.

Ustarroz said that the original plan was for them to wait several days to release an audit report, but that same morning it was abruptly decided to produce a preliminary version that caused protests and roadblocks in Bolivia, without the intervention of the local police.

Another proactive endorser of demands for Almagro's resignation was former Foreign Minister and current Argentine Senator Jorge Taiana: he signed the proclamation issued by the Puebla Group, the progressive Latin American think tank, accompanied by former presidents Dilma Rousseff (Brazil), Ernesto Samper (Colombia), Rafael Correa (Ecuador), José Luis Zapatero (Spain) and Fernando Lugo (Paraguay), among others.

Taiana will also prepare a statement to be voted in the Foreign Affairs Committee of the Argentine Upper House, which will be enough to make Cambiemos uncomfortable. He already achieved this 15 days ago, when he incorporated a repudiation of Almagro for preventing the renewal of the mandate of the executive secretary Paulo Abrao in the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR). The UCR and the PRO abstained.

Just as the leaders of the main opposition front feel comfortable confronting the government with their ambivalence regarding Venezuela, the case of Bolivia has always weighed on them and they tried to avoid it with evasive maneuvers.

Almagro was reelected on March 20 in a face-to-face vote in the midst of the pandemic and only received lukewarm support from Argentina in a PRO communiqué signed by its president, Patricia Bullrich, but there was no pronouncement from legislators and no official expression from the UCR. Alberto supported the frustrated candidacy of Ecuadorian Maria Fernanda Espinosa, a failed bet with almost no internal support in Argentina.

Arce's victory, furthermore, opened a regional dispute that until now seemed unequal due to the predominance of liberal governments in the region. On Sunday, Cristina and Alberto celebrated the Chilean referendum that voted in favor of reforming the Constitution as their own victory.

In February, there will be another key event in Ecuador, where Correa will compete as Andrés Aráuz's running mate, despite an eight-year prison sentence for alleged corruption. It will be another chapter in the regional rift. With a mirror in Argentina.