Eduardo González
King Philip VI highlighted yesterday before the Conference of Ambassadors the “new stage” in relations with Morocco and expressed Spain’s desire to maintain “the same relations” with Algeria and other “Maghrebi neighbors”. He also announced that, next February, he and Queen Letizia will make a State visit to Angola, “the first to Sub-Saharan Africa”.
“In 2023 Spain will assume for the fifth time the Presidency of the Council of the European Union” and it does so “in an unprecedented context,” said the Monarch during the closing of the VII Conference of Ambassadors of Spain, which was held since Monday at the headquarters of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in the Plaza del Marqués de Salamanca and which brought together the 118 ambassadors and 11 permanent representatives in international organizations that Spain has in the world.
“Next month will mark one year since the beginning of the Russian Federation’s war against Ukraine, a flagrant violation of the most basic norms and principles of international law and the United Nations Charter,” he continued.
“Spain, consistent and constant in its defense of the principle of sovereignty and territorial integrity of States, has expressed and materialized its support for Ukraine in all areas: political, humanitarian, military and with a view to the future reconstruction of the country, as well as in the fight against impunity”, because “Russia’s actions do not only affect Ukraine or Europe, but are a threat to international peace and security”, warned the King, who was accompanied by the Minister of Foreign Affairs, José Manuel Albares; the Minister of Defense, Margarita Robles; the State Secretary for Foreign and Global Affairs, Ángeles Moreno Bau; the State Secretary for the European Union, Pascual Navarro; the State Secretary for Ibero-America, the Caribbean and Spanish in the World, Juan Fernández Trigo; the State Secretary for International Cooperation, Pilar Cancela; and the Director of the Instituto Cervantes, Luis García Montero, among others.
On the other hand, Philip VI highlighted the importance of Spain’s relations with the countries of the Mediterranean and the Arab world. “With Morocco we have begun a new stage that should allow us to move forward on stronger and more solid pillars, and with all our Maghrebi neighbors -Algeria, Mauritania, Tunisia and we hope also with Libya- we want to have those same relations, based on the same principles of mutual respect and respect for our respective spheres of sovereignty, compliance with agreements and genuine cooperation,” he continued.
“We cannot forget that the Maghreb is part of Africa”, a “continent of opportunity and future, which requires building relationships of lasting trust and genuine interest in shared progress” and with which “Spain has been making an effort to increase the number of Embassies” and to increase “contacts at different levels”, the King affirmed. “Next February, Her Majesty the Queen and I will travel to Angola: it will be our first State visit to a Sub-Saharan African country and we are looking forward to it with special enthusiasm”, he announced.
Other interventions
Yesterday’s session began with the intervention of the State Secretary for International Cooperation, Pilar Cancela, who informed the ambassadors that the priorities of Spanish Cooperation for 2023 are the reinforcement of the EU’s Team Europe, “development in transition” (a concept developed by ECLAC together with the European Commission and the OECD Development Center to address development based on the specific structural needs of the countries) and gender equality. “In addition, we want to strengthen the triple nexus between humanitarian assistance, development cooperation and the promotion of peace,” she added.
The European Commissioner for International Partnerships of the European Union, Jutta Urpilainen, also spoke at the meeting. She defended the need to strengthen “ties between the EU and Latin America and the Caribbean” and, therefore, the opportunity offered by the EU-CELAC Summit, scheduled during the Spanish Presidency. For her part, the First Vice-President of the Government and Minister of Economic Affairs and Digital Transformation, Nadia Calviño, assured that the Spanish economy “is holding up very well in a complex international context” thanks to “the effectiveness of the six packages of measures and the containment of energy prices”, which has allowed inflation to fall five points in five months. “We have the lowest inflation in the EU and the euro zone,” she assured. The last intervention before the closing ceremony corresponded to the Minister of Defense, Margarita Robles, who, in response to a question from the Spanish Ambassador in Berne, Celsa Nuño, revealed that Switzerland is vetoing the shipment from Spain to Ukraine of certain military material that requires the endorsement of the manufacturing country in order to be re-exported.
For its part, the Association of Spanish Women Diplomats (AMDE) highlighted yesterday that 31 of the 123 ambassadors who participated in the Conference were women. “It is positive that the numbers have improved,” the association stated via Twitter. “It is also important to keep moving forward at an increasing pace to achieve an egalitarian foreign service,” it concluded.
