The Diplomat
Queen Letizia arrived yesterday in Colombia to make her eighth cooperation trip since 2015, in which she will be able to learn on the ground about the work carried out by the Spanish Cooperation in the areas of health, governance and gender equality, rural development and food security.
Queen Letizia left Madrid yesterday accompanied by the Secretary of State for International Cooperation, Pilar Cancela. In Colombia, Spanish Cooperation is accompanying the country’s efforts to implement the peace agreements, with special attention to strengthening the social rule of law, sustainable economic development, social cohesion, gender equality and the fight against violence against women. During her stay, the Queen will be able to see first-hand the work carried out by the Spanish Agency for International Development Cooperation (AECID), decentralized cooperation and Spanish NGOs.
The Queen’s agenda will begin today in Cartagena de Indias, where, accompanied by the Colombian First Lady, Verónica Alcocer -whom she had the opportunity to meet at the beginning of May on the occasion of President Gustavo Petro’s state visit to Spain-, she will visit two Spanish Cooperation projects.
On the one hand, she will visit a project to provide access to drinking water for 165,000 people in the Villahermosa neighborhood, financed by the Water and Sanitation Cooperation Fund. On the other hand, she will visit a workshop school on cultural heritage and restoration for young people at risk of exclusion, created with the support of the Spanish Cooperation in 1992 and which depends entirely on the Colombian State. The Queen and Alcocer will visit the Santa Catalina Bastion, one of the emblematic monuments of the city and whose restoration was carried out by young people from this Workshop School.
The trip will continue tomorrow in Cali, where Letizia will visit a cooperative for the cultivation and sale of coffee in the hands of former rebel fighters of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), an initiative funded by the EU. The Queen will also visit another gardening workshop school, which will conclude her visit to the country.
This is the eighth cooperation trip made by the Queen, who has recovered a custom started by Queen Sofia in 1997. Previously, Doña Letizia traveled to Honduras and El Salvador (2015), Senegal (2017), Dominican Republic and Haiti (2018), Mozambique (2019), again Honduras (2020), Paraguay (late 2021) and Mauritania (May 2022). The purpose of these visits is to support Spanish Cooperation, to learn first-hand about the work carried out by AECID or Spanish NGOs and to verify the effectiveness of the projects financed by Spain and their direct impact on the beneficiaries.
