Paraguay’s Industry and Commerce Minister Luis Castiglioni on Monday suggested building a Donald Trump-style wall on the Argentine border to end smuggling.

“I would like to build a wall on the border with Argentina, like Mr. Trump proposed during his term as president while frustrated over illegal immigration,” Castiglioni said in an interview with Paraguayan radio station Ñandutí.

The former vice president and International Relations Minister added that Argentina’s macroeconomic policies, which are “completely different” from Paraguay’s, and its “critical and chronic” economic problems “make all its bordering countries suffer.”

“I always say that I would like to build a great wall along the border with Argentina, because it’s really hard to fight against this scourge [contraband] when the economic incentives are so big,” he said.

Castiglioni’s comments were made after Argentine Customs fined several people this Sunday who were trying to bring a motorbike and two cars with forged and irregular paperwork from Argentina to Paraguay. One of the vehicles was stolen.

Domingo Peppo, Argentine ambassador to Paraguay, said in an interview with Argentine TV station C5N that he was surprised to hear Castiglioni’s proposal and expects it to be just an “unfortunate comment.”

Peppo added that he hopes the minister will offer clarification and apologize for his comments, which he said contained “important contradictions.”

“During the pandemic, when borders were completely closed, Paraguay worked hard on opening those borders back up. Closing the borders had a very serious social and economic impact on the border cities,” Peppo said.

The ambassador said building a wall would be completely unfeasible — rivers flow along the border — but also because “the Paraguayan people would suffer the greatest inconvenience.”

Customs said that anyone who brings products to Argentina for a limited time and does not re-export it by the required deadline is breaching the country’s Customs Code, and can be fined at least 30% of the product’s value.