MADRID.– Spain XXX is set to be installed tomorrow Thursday Ibero-American Summit in which the participation of 10 of the 22 leaders of the countries that make up this community is expected, and among those absent will be the head in charge of Venezuela Delcy Rodriguez and the presidents of Brazil, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva; and from Mexico, Claudia Sheinbaum.
These three countries will be represented by their Foreign Ministers at the meeting organized by Spain together with the Ibero-American General Secretariat and which will take place in Madrid on November 4 and 5, the government reported.
The forum, which is celebrating its 35th anniversary, seeks to relaunch the Ibero-American space to achieve tangible results on topics such as artificial intelligence, disaster response or academic mobility, after the failure of the 2024 meeting in Cuenca, Ecuador.
This Wednesday the King of Spain Felipe VI received some of the presidents who began to arrive in the capital. Among them are those of Chile, Portugal, Dominican Republic, Argentina, Bolivia, Costa Rica, Guatemala, Honduras and Andorra.
Rodríguez with sanctions
The Spanish government as host of the event was satisfied with the number of participating countries, but was brief in reporting absences, according to reports.
In the case of Rodríguez, it was pointed out that in order for him to travel to Spain he needed the government of Pedro Sánchez to request an exemption due to the sanctions that the European Union (EU) imposed on him on June 25, 2018 in his capacity as Maduro’s vice president, and that are still active.
That argument would not have been an obstacle, sources assured the agencies who attributed it to the internal situation of the country.
However, the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) last October dismissed an appeal filed by Rodríguez and ratified the sanctions imposed by the bloc, according to information.
On that occasion, the EU imposed measures against the current head and other Maduro officials, considering them responsible for “violating human rights and undermining democracy and the rule of law.”
Due to these sanctions, Rodríguez was prohibited from entering Spanish territory in 2021, but he did so upon arriving on a flight at the Barajas airport with the consent of those linked to the Sánchez government and in irregular circumstances not yet clarified, a case that was called Delcygate.
Other absences
In the case of Lula, it was reported that the post-electoral moment in Brazil influenced the absence due to the wear and fatigue of the president re-elected for the sixth time.
It was also assured that although the president of Mexico “has been very involved in the summit”, Sheinbaum travels very little outside her country and will soon attend the summit of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation Forum (APEC) in China to assume the presidency of this organization.
