The Diplomat
King Philip VI, the President of the Government, Pedro Sánchez, and the Secretary General of NATO, Jeans Stoltenberg, will participate next Monday, May 30, at the Royal Theater in Madrid, in the acts of Commemoration of the 40th Anniversary of Spain’s accession to the Atlantic Alliance.
The event will be attended by former Prime Ministers Felipe González, José María Aznar and José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, according to government sources, who said that the attendance of Mariano Rajoy has yet to be confirmed.
Several former NATO Secretaries General have also been invited, such as Javier Solana (former Foreign Minister and the only Spaniard to have held the post, between 1995 and 1999), Anders Fogh Rasmussen and Lord Robertson, pending further confirmations. The Government has also invited the members of the Atlantic Council, made up of the ambassadors of the 30 member states to the Alliance’s headquarters in Brussels, who will be accompanied by the ambassadors of these same countries accredited in Spain.
The event will begin with a speech by Pedro Sánchez, followed by a speech by Stoltenberg and will be closed by the King, after a colloquium between former NATO Secretaries General. The event will conclude with an honorary concert, after which Philip VI and Queen Letizia will offer a private lunch to all guests at the Royal Palace.
Spain became the 16th member of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization on May 30, 1982, during Leopoldo Calvo Sotelo’s term as Prime Minister. After a period of reflection opened with the victory of Felipe González (PSOE) in the elections of October of that year, membership of the Alliance was ratified by referendum on March 12, 1986.
For several years, Spain participated in all areas of NATO’s work, except for the integrated military structure. On November 14, 1996 (during José María Aznar’s term of office), the Congress of Deputies authorized the Government to negotiate Spain’s entry into the new NATO command structure.
On July 8 and 9, 1997, Spain hosted for the first time the NATO Summit in Madrid, which concluded with a communiqué stating Spain’s aspiration to participate “fully” in the integrated military structure. Full membership finally took place in 1999. Therefore, the next NATO Summit in Madrid, which will take place on June 29-30, is the second to be held in Spain, coinciding with Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
