MEXICO CITY (AP) — Spain issued a statement on Tuesday questioning as “unacceptable” that King Felipe VI was not invited to the inauguration of the next president of Mexico, Claudia Sheinbaum.
For this reason, the Spanish government has decided not to send any representative to the ceremony that will take place on October 1st. "The Government of Spain considers the exclusion of H.M. the King from the invitation to the inauguration of the elected president of Mexico, Claudia Sheinbaum Pardo, unacceptable...For this reason, it has decided not to participate in said inauguration at any level," indicates the press release published by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
Why is there a bad relationship between Spain and Mexico?
The statement from the government of socialist Pedro Sánchez heightens the underlying tension between the two countries, which has been present since the beginning of President Andrés Manuel López Obrador's administration.
In 2019, the leader demanded that the king apologize for the conquest, something that the monarch did not do and that provoked angry criticisms from the Spanish government and even mockery from indigenous groups, such as the Zapatista movement.
Later in 2022, López Obrador "paused" relations with Spain —a non-diplomatic term that was never clear what it meant— after accusing Spanish energy companies of treating Mexico as their fiefdom.
Why didn't Mexico invite the King of Spain?
Recently, when controversy arose over a supposed invitation from Mexico to Russian President Vladimir Putin to attend the event, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs explained that, according to its protocol, it sent diplomatic notes to all nations around the world with which it maintains relations and then it was up to the countries in question to decide who they would send.
In the case of Spain, invitations to handover ceremonies are traditionally addressed to the king.
Felipe de Borbón has been present at dozens of presidential inaugurations in Latin America, and his absence at Mexico's, one of the countries with the strongest bilateral relations with Spain, is symbolic, especially when it involves the first woman to come to power in the North American country.
According to the team of the still president-elect, more than a dozen heads of state or government have already confirmed their attendance at the ceremony, the majority of them Latin American, including the presidents of Brazil, Chile, Colombia, and Cuba.
In addition, the First Lady of the United States, Jill Biden, has also confirmed her attendance. She will lead the United States delegation, another country with which Mexico is experiencing moments of bilateral tension.