Virgilio Barco Vargas (September 17, 1921 – May 20, 1997) was a politician and diplomat from Colombia. He was a member of the Colombian Liberal Party and served as president of Colombia from August 7, 1986 until August 7, 1990.
Barco was born in Cúcuta, Norte de Santander Department, in north-eastern Colombia. Graduated of Civil Engineer from Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1958, He entered politics in 1943 when he became a city council ...
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Virgilio Barco Vargas (September 17, 1921 – May 20, 1997) was a politician and diplomat from Colombia. He was a member of the Colombian Liberal Party and served as president of Colombia from August 7, 1986 until August 7, 1990.
Barco was born in Cúcuta, Norte de Santander Department, in north-eastern Colombia. Graduated of Civil Engineer from Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1958, He entered politics in 1943 when he became a city council member in the town of Durania for the Liberal Party. He was then elected to the lower house of Congress, but went into exile in the late 1940s because of violence between liberals and conservatives. He lived in the United States, where his daughter, Carolina Barco (who would later become a Colombian politician herself) was born.
Barco returned to Colombia in 1954 to help negotiate the peace process which allowed the formation of the National Front between liberals and conservatives, which lasted two decades. He became a member of the Senate,...
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