Far from dissipating, the spiral of diplomatic tension between the governments of Pedro Sánchez and Javier Milei continues to escalate, already at the gates of the campaign for the European elections on 9-J. To the point that the leadership of the PSOE , which includes the Argentine president in the “ultra-right international” that it warns threatens to undermine the foundations of the EU, trusts that the “insults” uttered by Milei, with the “incitement to political violence” of his host, Santiago Abascal, at the event they starred in on Sunday in Madrid, become an electoral “revolutionary” to mobilize the progressive voter on 9-J.
The Minister of Foreign Affairs, José Manuel Albares, announced yesterday the definitive withdrawal of the Spanish ambassador to Buenos Aires, María Jesús Alonso, after having fallen on deaf ears to the demand for a “public rectification” that Sánchez previously asked Milei, for having called his wife, Begoña Gómez, “corrupt” at the Vox rally at the Vistalegre palace, in which the Italian Giorgia Meloni, the Hungarian Viktor Orbán and the French Marine Le Pen also took part .
On Sunday, Albares already appeared in Moncloa, to solemnize the seriousness of the diplomatic clash, and announced the call for consultations by the Spanish ambassador in Buenos Aires, as an expression of protest. On Monday, the minister summoned the Argentine ambassador in Madrid, Roberto Bosch, to demand a rectification of Milei. But the Argentine president replied that it is the Spanish Government that should apologize, following the “complaints” received, since Minister Óscar Puente had previously accused him of consuming “substances”. Sánchez himself warned that his answer would be “in accordance with the dignity of Spanish democracy”. And Albares, faced with “a frontal attack with insults” on our institutions by Milei, announced yesterday the definitive withdrawal of the Spanish ambassador to Buenos Aires. A chargé d’affaires will remain at the head of the diplomatic delegation.
The Minister of Foreign Affairs left the next moves up in the air, without ruling anything out, as Milei plans to return to Spain on June 21. “For those who want to understand, collaboration is always more powerful than confrontation”, warned Albares. They could ban him from entering Spain.
Therefore, in the midst of escalating tension with the Argentine president, the campaign for the European elections begins on Thursday night. The PSOE consider that the victory of Salvador Illa in the Catalan elections of 12-M means “recognition” before this new date with the ballot boxes. And that the diatribes of the “ultra international”, which includes Milei and Abascal, should serve as a “shocker for all the democrats to react” and go vote. “We have to stop this at the polls”, they warn.
The image of the “global far right” gathered in Vistalegre, with Milei as a guest star, is “enormously worrying”, they point out. “They come to Madrid, to Spain, because it is the stronghold they want to conquer”, they say, in front of the progressive leadership they attribute to Sánchez in Europe.
In this Vox act, they point out that “messages of real threat” were expressed. And they point out that this act of the far right should be interpreted as “a warning” that Europe, as a bastion of the welfare state and social rights, should not be taken for granted. “Even the Roman Empire fell”, they allege.
“We play with it a lot”, warn Ferraz. And Sánchez will seek a mobilization of the progressive electorate to curb the rise of the right and the extreme right that the polls predict, as already happened in the general elections of July 2023, in which the leader of the PSOE, despite the triumph of the PP, he added almost a million more votes than in 2019 and revalidated the position of president of the Executive.
“There is a real risk”, they warn the PSOE again before 9-J, due to the wave of “extreme right-wing populism” and the “increasing normalization” of the “ultra agenda” on the part of the right traditional, which, in his opinion, can plunge the European institutions into a “regressive process”.
Sánchez, who on Saturday already started warming up his engines with a rally in Barcelona, ??has five more dates booked on his campaign agenda. It will start on Thursday in Valencia and, after visiting Seville, Valladolid and Málaga, it will close the tour in Madrid. José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero will also put on his campaign boots again. And the current high representative of the EU for Foreign Affairs, Josep Borrell, will join them in the final stretch.
And everyone is crossing their fingers: “We can be the most voted force and with the most seats”, they are confident.
