<h6><strong>The Diplomat</strong></h6> <h4><strong>Queen Letizia visited the headquarters of the Spanish Agency for International Development Cooperation (AECID) in Madrid this Friday, coinciding with the tenth anniversary of her first cooperation trip, which took place in 2015 to Honduras and El Salvador.</strong></h4> During the institutional event, the Queen participated in a working meeting with the State Secretary for International Cooperation, Eva Granados, and the Director of AECID, Antón Leis, in which they discussed the achievements of the last ten years and the challenges facing Spanish cooperation in the current global context. Later, Queen Letizia held an informal meeting with AECID staff and visited the new library and multipurpose room. Queen Letizia made her first cooperation trip in May 2015, specifically to Honduras and El Salvador, thus resuming a custom initiated in 1997 by Queen Sofía. On that trip, the Queen participated in projects related to water and sanitation, education, technical training, gender, the fight against violence, and heritage. Subsequently, in December 2017, Letizia traveled to Senegal, where she visited the Technical Cooperation Office in Dakar and the Cheikh Anta Diop University (Aula Cervantes) and learned about cultural and gender initiatives. In March and April 2018, she traveled to the Dominican Republic and Haiti, where she toured banana cooperatives and visited projects to prevent teenage pregnancy in the Dominican Republic and sanitation and education projects in Haiti. In April 2019, she traveled to Mozambique, where she traveled to Maputo and Manhiça to oversee water, municipal land registry, and technical training projects. In May 2020, she traveled again to Honduras to visit humanitarian and cooperation projects. In January and February 2021, she traveled to Paraguay, where she toured Asunción, Encarnación, and Bañado Sur, visiting health, entrepreneurship, and cultural centers. And in May and June 2022, she traveled to Mauritania, on her eighth visit to learn about health, gender, rural development, and food security projects. In June 2023, she traveled to Colombia, where she visited Cartagena, a training center and productive projects led by women; in June 2024, she traveled to Guatemala to visit training centers and kidney health projects in Antigua; and finally, in March 2025, she traveled to Cape Verde to address gender-based violence and visit equality and blue economy projects. These trips, according to the AECID, have made it possible to highlight the work of Spanish cooperation on the ground, support cooperation personnel, and institutionalize a practice that reinforces the commitment to sustainable development and human rights. The Queen has visited health centers, schools, cultural spaces, agricultural cooperatives, and projects led by women, "reinforcing the human, social, and transformative dimension of Spanish international cooperation," it added.
