Eduardo González
The attendance of King Felipe VI and the Minister of Foreign Affairs, José Manuel Albares, at the inauguration of the new president of Uruguay, Yamandú Orsi, which will take place this coming Saturday, March 1, marks the seventeenth occasion on which the head of diplomacy has accompanied the current Monarch on a trip abroad, which will allow him to overtake his predecessor José Manuel García-Margallo, who did so on 16 occasions.
According to diplomatic sources told The Diplomat, Albares has accompanied the King on 16 trips abroad, which will rise to 17 with the one to Uruguay. In addition, the minister accompanied the Princess of Asturias, Doña Leonor, on her first official trip abroad, which took place on July 12, 2024 in Portugal.
Most of these trips have been to Latin America on the occasion of the inaugurations of presidents, as is the case of the one taking place this Saturday in Montevideo. He also accompanied the King last November to participate in a working session of the Alliance of Civilizations in Estoril (Portugal).
All in all, according to the aforementioned sources, the number of official trips by Minister Albares with members of the Royal House (the King, the two Kings or the Princess of Asturias), up to a total of 18, is the highest in the history of democracy compared to his predecessors.
For example, Arancha González Laya accompanied the King on four occasions, Josep Borrell on ten and Alfonso Dastis on four. He also surpasses José Manuel García-Margallo, despite the fact that the latter was responsible for the international tour to present the King and that he is the recent minister who has remained in office the longest, with a total of five years in which he made 16 official trips with the current King.
Albares is, therefore, the Government minister who has accompanied the King and members of the Royal Family on their trips abroad the most times and the one who has delegated this task the least to Secretaries of State.
Apart from the four Cooperation trips made by the Queen during Albares’ mandate, which are traditionally accompanied by the person who holds the position of Secretary of State for Cooperation, the minister has only delegated a Secretary of State for this type of trip on four occasions (this was the case at the inauguration of the President of Argentina, Javier Milei, in which the King was accompanied by the then Secretary of State for Ibero-America, Juan Fernández Trigo).
The King represents Spain at the inaugurations of Ibero-American presidents, a task that Don Felipe has been assuming since 1996 when he was still Prince of Asturias. In the case of Uruguay, this is the eighteenth participation of Felipe VI in the inauguration of an Ibero-American leader since he became King.
Specifically, the Monarch was present at the inauguration of Andrés Manuel López Obrador as President of Mexico in 2018; in 2019, at that of Panamanian Laurentino Cortizo; in 2020, at those of Uruguayan Luis Lacalle Pou and Bolivian Luis Arce; in 2021, at those of Ecuadorian Guillermo Lasso Mendoza and Peruvian Pedro Castillo; in 2022, at those of Honduran Xiomara Castro, Chilean Gabriel Boric, Costa Rican Rodrigo Chaves and Colombian Gustavo Petro; in 2023, at those of Brazilian Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, Paraguayan Santiago Peña Palacios and Argentine Javier Milei; and in 2024, at those of Guatemalan President César Bernardo Arévalo de León; Panamanian President José Raúl Mulino Quintero; and the re-elected Nayib Bukele, from El Salvador, and Luis Abinader, from the Dominican Republic.