Spain lodged formal complaint against Mexico for snub to King Felipe

Spain formally protested Mexico’s decision not to invite King Felipe VI to the inauguration of Claudia Sheinbaum, Mexico’s first female president. On Tuesday — the same day that EL PAÍS revealed that Mexico had not sent the King of Spain an invitation — the Spanish Foreign Affairs Ministry sent a formal complaint to the Mexican Foreign Affairs Ministry.

The Foreign Affairs Ministry’s note verbale — as it is called in diplomatic language, although it is actually a written text — stated that King Felipe “is the head of state and, as such, assumes the highest representation of the Spanish state in international relations.” After stressing that the intensity of bilateral relations between the two countries “makes it advisable for institutional relations to be developed at the highest level” and that Felipe VI has attended previous inaugurations, including that of the current president, Andrés López Obrador in 2018, it concluded that, “in an act of such importance for the people of Mexico, Spain must be represented by its head of state.”

Despite the friendly tone of the official message, it ended by saying that, “having exhausted all channels to respectfully convey the level of representation that corresponds to Spain, […] there will be no representation of the Kingdom of Spain at the Transfer of Federal Executive Power in Mexico City,” on October 1.

The message was delivered in two ways: the Mexican ambassador in Madrid was summoned to the headquarters of Spain’s Foreign Affairs Ministry; while the Spanish ambassador in Mexico went to the Mexican Foreign Affairs Ministry to deliver it personally.

That same day, the Spanish Foreign Affairs Ministry issued a statement which described King Felipe’s exclusion from the inauguration of the Mexican president as “unacceptable” and announced that Spain would not participate “at any level.” The following day, in New York, Spanish Prime Minister Sánchez expressed his “great sadness that two brother nations — because of the political interest of some — cannot have the best relations between peoples and between two progressive governments that share values and probably policies.”

The note verbale in protest of Mexico’s decision was the culmination of a tug-of-war that began on July 22, when Mexican authorities invited Sánchez to Sheinbaum’s inauguration, but not Felipe de Borbón, who has been present at more than 80 inaugurations throughout Latin America, first as Prince of Asturias and then as King.

In response, the Spanish government marked Sánchez’s invitation as “not received” and began a series of diplomatic efforts to try to convince the Mexican authorities to address the invitation to the king. The last of these efforts was a personal call from Sánchez to the president-elect of Mexico, which also did not achieve results.

On Wednesday, Sheinbaum made public a statement in which she justified her decision not to invite the King of Spain to her inauguration. In the missive, she confirmed that she did not invite Spain’s King Felipe because he did not respond to a 2019 letter sent by President Andrés Manuel López Obrador, which demanded an apology for the harm caused by the Spanish conquest of the Americas.

“Regrettably, this letter [sent by López Obrador] did not merit any direct response, as would have corresponded to the best diplomatic practice of bilateral relations,” said Sheinbaum, who will assume the presidency on October 1. The president-elect, however, expressed confidence that this difference “will also be a starting point for Spain and Mexico to improve their bilateral relations.”

While no representative from the Spanish state will be president at Sheinbaum’s inauguration on Tuesday, several Spanish politicians will be in attendance, including Gerardo Pisarello, Jon Iñarritu, Ana Pontón and Irene Montero.

The secretary general of the left-wing Podemos party, Ione Belarra, has described Sánchez’s decision not to attend the ceremony as an “unbearable exercise in monarchical servility.” On the other hand, Alberto Núñez Feijóo, the leader of the conservative Popular Party (PP), described the Spanish government’s response as “logical” in the face of what he called an “unacceptable provocation.”

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