( Spanish) – This week, Spain and Mexico wrote a new chapter in their diplomatic relations, which are increasingly strained due to the disagreements caused by Claudia Sheinbaum’s inauguration as president of Mexico on October 1.
The Spanish Foreign Ministry announced late on Tuesday that it will not send any representation at any level to the event due to the “unacceptable” exclusion of King Felipe VI. A weighty position that the Spanish Minister of Defense, Margarita Robles, defended on Wednesday morning while lamenting, given that according to her “the Mexican people are a brother people.”
For her part, Sheinbaum clarified this Wednesday in a statement shared on her social networks that her intention was only to invite the president of the Spanish Government, Pedro Sánchez, with whom she had spoken about the matter a few days ago.
As Sheinbaum adds in the statement, the distancing from the Royal House of Spain began in March 2019, when Andrés Manuel López Obrador, in his first year at the head of the Government of Mexico, sent a personal letter to the Spanish head of state reflecting on the almost 200 years of independence of the country and exposing the grievances caused by Spain five hundred years ago during the conquest of Mexico.
An exposition that ended by urging Spain to “admit its historical responsibility for these offenses and offer the appropriate apologies or political compensation.” A task that López Obrador proposed to carry out bilaterally “to achieve the objective of holding a joint ceremony at the highest level in 2021” where “the Kingdom of Spain publicly and officially expresses its recognition of the grievances caused.”
The request received no response from the Royal Family and took the Spanish Government by surprise, which “deeply” regretted that the letter was made public, “the content of which we firmly reject.” “The arrival, five hundred years ago, of the Spanish to the current Mexican lands cannot be judged in the light of contemporary considerations,” read a statement shared by the Spanish Foreign Ministry on behalf of the Executive.
López Obrador addressed this issue on two more occasions, the first at a “morning” press conference in July 2021. On the second occasion, more heatedly, the Mexican president suggested in February 2022 “pausing” relations with Spain until a new government came into office. “I would like us to postpone normalisation to give ourselves a break that I think is good for Mexicans and Spaniards.” López Obrador accompanied these words with strong criticism of Spanish companies, which he accused of benefiting from policies that favoured private interests.
These statements were “flatly” rejected by the Spanish Executive in 2022, which considered them “disqualifications.” However, the Spanish Ministry of Foreign Affairs responded in a softer tone, pointing out that they would “always work to maintain the best relations with Mexico.”
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