The Diplomat
The Congress is looking for a way for the President of Ukraine, Volodomir Zelenski, to speak by videoconference before the deputies and explain the situation of his country in the face of the Russian invasion and, at the same time, to obtain the express support of the Spanish Parliament.
Zelenski already spoke before the British Parliament on the 8th with a vibrant speech in which he made Churchill’s mythical phrase from the Second World War his own: “We will not surrender”.
The Bureau of Congress received an initial request from Vox and, as of yesterday, it has a letter already signed by all the parliamentary groups in the House.
The spokesman for Vox. Iván Espinosa de los Monteros, asked the governing body of the House to give Zelenski the opportunity to use Congress as a “loudspeaker” in the face of the “unjustifiable” attack by Vladimir Putin’s regime.
“This would be a sign of Spain’s commitment, in the exercise of the position of international relevance that it should hold, to the Ukrainian government and people,” Espinosa de los Monteros said in his text, reported by Europa Press.
Last Thursday, after a declaration of support for Ukraine and condemnation of the invasion was approved in the Congressional Foreign Affairs Committee, both the PP and the PSOE advocated extending an official invitation to Zelenski.
Thus, PP Foreign Affairs spokesperson Valentina Martínez expressed her wish that Congress could have the opportunity to listen to Zelenski as the British Parliament has done. Her PSOE colleague, Sergio Gutiérrez, took up the gauntlet and encouraged all the groups to sign a joint petition to invite the Ukrainian president “in any format, formal or informal” so that he could address the Cortes Generales and the Spanish people “as soon as possible”.
“This appearance via telematic means is taking place in other parliaments around the world and is clearly supporting international legality and respect for human rights”, said Gutiérrez, who believes that it would be “very convenient” for the parliamentary groups to promote it in Spain as well.
The President of Congress, Meritxell Batet, who last week invited the Minister Counsellor and Chargé d’Affaires of the Ukrainian Embassy in Madrid, Dmytro Matiuschenko, to the plenary session, is now studying possible alternative formulas for organising this videoconference.
Parliamentary sources say that, as head of state, Zelenski could speak in the Chamber, taking advantage of the giant screens in the Plenary Hall, or move the videoconference to a room to address the members of the Foreign Affairs Committee or the Joint Committee (Congress-Senate) of the European Union.
In addition to illuminating the façade of the Palace of Congress with the colours of the Ukrainian flag, the President of the House, Meritxell Batet, held a video conference with her Ukrainian counterpart, Ruslan Stefanchuk, to convey Spain’s solidarity with his people and to inform him of the commitments made by Spain in defence of the country’s territorial integrity.
