Lima, 22 Mar Venezuela formalized on Tuesday the full return of its diplomatic relations with Peru with the presentation of the credentials of its new ambassador to Lima, Alexander Yánez Deleuze, to the Peruvian President, Pedro Castillo, at a ceremony held at the Government Palace in Lima. Yánez Deleuze was the first ambassador to participate in a short ceremony in which the new diplomatic representatives of Brazil, Portugal and Australia also presented their credentials. Nicolás Maduro's government appointed him the new ambassador to Peru on October 15 last year “as part of a new stage in bilateral relations between the two countries,” as the Venezuelan Ministry of Foreign Affairs said at that time. That same day, the Peruvian Foreign Ministry announced the appointment of Richard Rojas García as the new Peruvian ambassador to Venezuela, but that appointment was terminated a few days later, after the judiciary ordered that he be prevented from leaving the country amid an investigation into a case of alleged money laundering. On December 7, the Peruvian Government appointed as ambassador to Venezuela the diplomat Librado Augusto Orozco, who on January 15 was received in Caracas by the Deputy Minister for Latin America of the Venezuelan Foreign Ministry, Rander Peña. On 28 December, the new Venezuelan ambassador presented his credentials to the then Peruvian Minister of Foreign Affairs, Oscar Maúrtua, With these appointments, both countries ended more than four years without ambassadors, as Peru withdrew its representative in Caracas in March 2017 and expelled the Venezuelan in August of that year, during the administration of Pedro Pablo Kuczynski (2016-2018). The Kuczynski Executive only maintained relations at the consular level and promoted the actions of the Lima Group, while supporting the entry of Venezuelan migrants into his country, which currently hosts more than 1.3 million of them. At Tuesday's ceremony, attended by Peruvian Foreign Minister César Landa, the new ambassadors of Brazil, Sérgio França Danese; Portugal, Joaquim Alberto de Sousa Moreira de Lemos, and Australia, Maree Misao Ringland, also delivered their credentials. The Presidency of Peru reported that the four diplomats “transmitted to the head of state the fraternal greeting of their peoples and their respective governments” and, subsequently, each of them was received by Castillo at the style audience. CHIEF dub/gdl/jrh