Luis Ayllón
Diplomat Maria Victoria Morera, who was the first woman to be appointed as Undersecretary of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, died last Wednesday night in Madrid after a long illness.
Matoya Morera, as she was known among her fellow diplomats, was 64 years old and entered the Diplomatic Service in 1982, so she had extensive professional experience, in different positions.
In July 2002, the then Minister of Foreign Affairs, Ana Palacio, appointed her as Director of her Cabinet and less than a year later she became Under-Secretary of Foreign Affairs, the first woman to hold this position.
Morera remained at the head of the Under-Secretariat until April 2004, when the new minister, Miguel Ángel Moratinos, appointed in the first government of the Socialist José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, decided to take over. Months later, she was appointed as Spain’s ambassador to Belgium, where she remained until 2007.
Since 2008 and for several years she was director of the Consular Emergency Unit for the attention of Spanish people abroad.
In 2012 she was appointed Director General of Bilateral Relations with Countries of the European Union, Candidate Countries and Countries of the European Economic Area, until in January 2017 she became head of the Spanish Embassy in the Federal Republic of Germany, the country in which she had begun her diplomatic career.
Morera also became the first woman to hold the post of ambassador to Germany, one of the countries considered most important for Spain.
Berlin was her last destination abroad and, moreover, she was only able to carry out her task until October 2018 when, after the arrival of Pedro Sánchez at La Moncloa, the Government approved her replacement by Ricardo Martínez.
Matoya Morera, who was already ill when she left, worked since then in the General Services Inspectorate of the Ministry.
Yesterday, the Association of Spanish Diplomats (ADE), when lamenting on its Twitter account the death of Matoya Morera, described her as “an important reference within the Service”.
For its part, the Association of Spanish Women Diplomats (AMDE), in the same social network, also expressed its sorrow for the death of Morera and, after noting that she was the first diplomat to occupy the posts of Undersecretary of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Ambassador to Germany, said she was a person “always committed to the fight for equality and an example for all.
