Join on WhatsApp 
Join on Telegram Rabat – As Mexico prepares to celebrate 211 years of independence from Spain and 500 years since the fall of Tenochtitlan, tensions between Spain and Mexico have heightened after Mexico excluded Spain from the celebratory event.
Every year on September 16, Mexico holds a military parade to commemorate its independence from Spain. Each year, the country invites its foreign allies to participate in the festivities.
This year Mexico will celebrate 500 years since the transformation of Tenochtitlán into Mexico City. A key historic landmark for the countries.
Despite the importance of the 2021 celebrations, Mexico excluded Spain.
The Spanish President Pedro Sanchez expressed his “enormous displeasure” with the decision.
In 2019, Mexico’s President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador met with Spain’s King Felipe VI to request an apology for the 300-year conquest of Mexico. The president cited the “violations of what we now call human rights” and referred to the Spanish conquest as a massacre of indigenous people.
Spain’s foreign minister responded by stating it was “weird to receive this request for an apology for events that occurred 500 years ago.”
While en-route to Russia for diplomatic talks, Mexico’s Secretary of Foreign Affairs Marcelo Ebrard made a pit stop in Madrid in late April, to attempt to reconcile some of the damages done by excluding the Spanish from the events.
Although the meeting between the Mexican and Spanish foreign ministers was productive in some diplomatic fields, the Spanish foreign minister echoed King Felipe VI’s regarding relations between Spain and Mexico and called for the two nations to “enhance a common past.”
“Spain wishes to actively accompany these celebrations that should allow us not only to enhance a common past but also and, above all, to reiterate our firm determination to continue contributing to the development and welfare, present and future, of its peoples and citizens,” said the King after Ebrard’s visit.
Relations between Spain and Mexico precede the incumbent presidential administration after former Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto involved Spain in a scandal stemming from Mexico’s state-run oil company PEMEX.
The former CEO of PEMEX Emilio Lozoya considered Spain a safe haven but was extradited back to Mexico in July 2020.
Lozoya agreed to provide videos of nearly a dozen Mexican politicians receiving bribes in return for a reduced sentence and his extradition to Mexico.
