<h6><strong>Eduardo González</strong></h6> <h4><strong>Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum has celebrated the recent statements made by Foreign Minister José Manuel Albares regarding the "pain and injustice" inflicted on "indigenous peoples," while the People's Party has called for his resignation "if he does not retract his statements."</strong></h4> Last Friday, during the inauguration of the exhibition "Half the World: Women in Indigenous Mexico" at the Cervantes Institute in Madrid, organized by the Ministry through the Spanish Agency for International Development Cooperation (AECID), Albares declared that in the relations between Spain and Mexico "there has also been pain, pain and injustice toward the indigenous peoples to whom this exhibition is dedicated." "There was injustice, it is right to acknowledge it today and it is right to lament it, because that is also part of our shared history and we cannot deny or forget it," he added. Albares's remarks came just days after Sheinbaum reiterated that her government is still "awaiting a response" to the letter from her predecessor, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, to King Felipe VI, urging him to apologize for the Spanish conquest. At her morning press conference last Friday, the Mexican president emphasized that Albares's words constitute "the first time that a Spanish government official has spoken of regretting the injustice." "It's important. From my point of view, it's a first step, and it speaks to the importance of what we've always said: forgiveness ennobles governments and nations," she continued. "It's not humiliating; on the contrary, recognizing history, acknowledging wrongs, asking for forgiveness or expressing regret, and reclaiming it as part of history, ennobles governments and nations," she asserted. "So, congratulations on this first step by the Spanish Foreign Minister in acknowledging the injustice, particularly in this Year of Indigenous Women," she concluded. "So, congratulations on this first step by the Spanish Foreign Minister in acknowledging the injustice, particularly in this Year of Indigenous Women," she concluded. That same Friday, the leader of the People's Party (PP), Alberto Núñez Feijóo, wrote on social media: “Let them apologize for what they are doing now. I am not going to be ashamed of my country's history. I am ashamed of the current situation to which this government is condemning us.” For his part, the Minister of the Presidency of the Community of Madrid, Miguel Ángel García Martín, demanded Albares' resignation, whom he described as “the worst representative our country has ever had, the worst Foreign Minister our country has ever had.” “He is a disastrous minister who doesn't know history,” and therefore, “he must resign if he doesn't retract his statements immediately,” he added.
