The Diplomat
The President of the Government, Pedro Sánchez, will travel this week to Argentina and Costa Rica with the triple objective of returning the recent official visit of the Argentine President, meeting with the leaders of the Central American Integration System (SICA) and supporting the interests of the important Spanish companies that will accompany him during the tour.
This new Latin American tour by Sánchez – which was announced by the president himself last May 17 on the occasion of his participation in the IV Congress of the Business Council Alliance for Ibero-America (CEAPI) – comes to complete the one he made in the summer of 2018 to Colombia, Bolivia, Chile and Costa Rica and the trips made to the region in the run-up to the pandemic, such as Mexico, Cuba or Guatemala, in this case to participate in the Ibero-American Summit.
The tour will begin tomorrow in Argentina, where he will be received at the Casa Rosada by the President of the Republic of Argentina, Alberto Fernández. Afterwards, the President of the Government and the Argentinean President will participate in a business meeting, sign several agreements and address the media. In the afternoon, Sánchez will receive representatives of the Spanish community living in Argentina at the Emigration Museum and will visit the former Navy Mechanics School (ESMA), now the Museum Site of Memory.
Pedro Sánchez’s trip to Buenos Aires -which will last two days and in which he will be accompanied by the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs and for Latin America and the Caribbean, Cristina Gallach, and by a large group of businessmen– had also been announced last May 11 in Madrid during Fernández’s official visit to Spain. On that occasion, the head of the Executive conveyed to the President of the South American country that the internationalization plan of the Spanish economy places “Argentina as one of the priority countries for Spanish presence and investment”, while Fernandez addressed the need to take advantage of the moment to renew the strategic partnership.
After his stay in Argentina, Sánchez will travel on Thursday, June 10, to San José, Costa Rica, to participate in the commemorative events of the thirtieth anniversary of SICA and meet with the leaders of the Central American countries, with whom he will address bilateral issues, the drama of refugees, the challenge of migration, the displacements aggravated by the pandemic and the consequences of climate change, such as hurricanes. In San José he will meet with the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Arancha González Laya, who on Wednesday will participate in the meeting of SICA foreign ministers and will meet with her Costa Rican counterpart, Rodolfo Solano. On June 11, Pedro Sánchez will attend a business forum, in which Spanish and Costa Rican companies will participate, and will be received by the President of the Republic of Costa Rica, Carlos Alvarado Quesada.
SICA is made up of Guatemala, Honduras, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Costa Rica and Panama, as well as the Dominican Republic as an associate country. This regional forum will be 30 years old in 2021, since it was created on December 13, 1991 with the signing of the Protocol to the Charter of the Organization of Central American States (ODECA), or Tegucigalpa Protocol, which replaced the ODECA Charter of 1951. Guatemala will assume the pro tempore presidency of SICA on July 1 for a six-month period and the country’s president, Alejandro Giammattei, recently announced his intention to meet with Pedro Sanchez in Costa Rica to request Spain’s support for access to COVID-19 vaccines. Spain is a major contributor to this organization through the Spain-SICA Fund.
