Albares boasts in Mexico of the “unprecedented” expansion and improvement of the Spanish consular network

Eduardo González Foreign Minister José Manuel Albares highlighted on Wednesday the expansion and improvement of the Spanish consular network, which has resulted in an “unprecedented” increase in staff, the creation of new consulates, and a €115 million investment in digitalization. “This is a good example of how our foreign policy improves the lives and daily routines of millions of Spaniards,” Albares stated during an event at the Spanish Consulate General in Mexico, as part of a tour of Latin America and the Caribbean that includes Puerto Rico, the Dominican Republic, and Mexico. During his address, Albares reviewed the expansion and digitization of the entire consular network, with particular attention to the Consular Digitization Plan, for which €115 million has been allocated from the Recovery, Transformation and Resilience Plan, and to the new tools in this area, such as the Electronic Headquarters, the Consular Citizen Folder, and the Unified Processing Desktop, which will improve the efficiency of all consular offices. These improvements, he assured, will allow for numerous consular procedures to be carried out online, such as managing the Consular Registration, obtaining appointments, and paying fees, thus facilitating processes and shortening processing times. They will also facilitate the issuance of consular digital certificates to Spaniards residing abroad without the need to travel to the Consular Office and free of charge. The minister also noted that the rollout of DICIREG, the new electronic Civil Registry system, which will be unified throughout Spain, was completed in 2025. Furthermore, Albares highlighted the increase in the hiring of staff abroad, with 2,300 workers since 2023 (nearly 700 in 2026, a 43 percent increase over the previous year). “This is an unprecedented increase,” the minister stated, noting that the compensation of staff hired abroad has been increased, with annual raises of between 2.5 and 3.5 percent over the last four years. Minister Albares also emphasized the establishment of new Consulates General in Camagüey and Bangalore, which join the existing Consulates General in Manchester and Chengdu, as well as the diplomatic missions in Iceland, Chad, Georgia, Armenia, Montenegro, Moldova, and Uzbekistan established in recent years. The minister also announced that in the coming months, the process will begin to establish a consular contact center to centrally handle all emergency-related inquiries received by consular offices. Democratic Memory Law Furthermore, the minister highlighted the efforts made to respond to the more than 2.45 million people who expressed interest in applying for Spanish nationality under the Democratic Memory Law. According to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, as of March 31, 2026, more than 1.2 million applications have been received in person at consular offices, 545,000 have been approved, and 306,500 registrations have been processed in the Consular Civil Registry. These figures, according to the Ministry, are significantly higher than the number of cases processed under the Historical Memory Law from 2008 to 2024, and in this instance, processing times were much shorter: in four years (between October 2022 and March 2026), more than double the number of applications were received. The Consulate General in Mexico has received the fifth highest number of applications (almost 100,000), and the Consulates in Argentina have processed the largest number of cases under this Law. The Minister also praised the close collaboration with the Ministry of Digital Transformation and the Civil Service to reinforce the staff of the offices with the heaviest workloads. The Consulates General in Córdoba, Rosario, Mendoza, Bahía Blanca, Santiago de Chile, and Montevideo have been reinforced, handling a heavier workload following the passage of the Law. “The Ministry of Foreign Affairs has made a great effort to assist all those interested in applying for Spanish nationality under this law, a long-standing demand of the Spanish community as a reparation measure for those who suffered exile, and to which the Ministry has responded swiftly and decisively,” the press release concludes.

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