The Diplomat
The President of the Government, Pedro Sánchez, will be able to fulfil his wish to meet with the President of the United States, Joe Biden, next Monday, the 14th. It will be in Brussels, in the margins of the NATO summit, where both will be present.
Moncloa sources assure that this first contact between the two leaders will not be a simple protocol greeting, but rather a conversation in which they will have time to get to know each other and discuss matters of interest to both countries.
This is what Sánchez’s chief of staff, Iván Redondo, and his US counterpart, Ron Klain, are said to have agreed by telephone,
Sánchez has been waiting to speak with the new occupant of the White House since he took office as president on 20 January. However, Biden has not considered it a priority to respond to the requests that have reached him from Spain in the contacts held at lower levels, including the videoconference held on 16 February between the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Arancha González Laya, and the US Secretary of State, Antony Blinken.
The absence of contact between Biden and Sánchez has been criticised by opposition parties, who point out that the US president has spoken with leaders of other countries considered less important than Spain.
However, sources at the US embassy in Madrid consulted by The Diplomat, point to the fact that there are no bilateral disputes that have required direct intervention by Biden, as is the case in other countries.
In any case, although there are no bilateral conflicts, there are issues of mutual interest that could be addressed by Biden and Sánchez, or at least pointed out, because the meeting is not expected to last long, given that there are many leaders who want to take advantage of the US president’s presence to talk to him.
However, the White House has so far only confirmed meetings with Queen Elizabeth of England during his visit to the United Kingdom and with King Philippe of Belgium in Brussels, as well as meetings between the President and the British Boris Johnson, the Belgian Alexander de Croo and the Swiss Guy Parmelin. He is also scheduled to meet with Turkish President Recep Tayipp Erdogan, and in Geneva, Switzerland, his expected meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Among the issues that could come up in the conversation is the crisis that Spain maintains with Morocco, encouraged in part by Rabat’s desire for Spain to join the United States’ recognition of the Moroccan status of Western Sahara.
In addition, the Prime Minister could ask Biden for his support for Spain to host the NATO summit in 2022, coinciding with the 40th anniversary of our entry into the Atlantic Alliance, when Leopoldo Calvo Sotelo was head of government, and despite the opposition of the PSOE at the time.at the moment, no decision has yet been taken on where future summits will be held.
