Former Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy participated this Tuesday in Buenos Aires in a business forum at which former Argentine President Mauricio Macri was also present. During the event, organized by the consultancy firm Abeceb and entitled “The battle of the year: status quo versus cultural change”, topical issues such as poverty, economic freedom and international relations were discussed . In his first intervention, Rajoy spoke of the DANA tragedy. in Valencia. “There are many people who have died, there are many relatives, many who have lost their properties, the volunteers who work,” he said, hoping that “soon everything will return to normal and that will remain like a bad memory. “Former Presidents’ Forum Although the business forum lasted all day, two of the most notable presences took place around noon local time, when Rajoy and Macri interacted in a panel titled “Reflections of Former Presidents on the ‘future of Latin America’ and also included by former Mexican President Felipe Calderón Related news standard No Spain withdraws its ambassador to Argentina after Milei reiterated his attacks against Sánchez Mariano. Alonso. The decision was taken after the Argentine president described the head of the Spanish government as “cowardly” Towards the start of In the debate, the axis was placed on geopolitics, linked in particular to the presidential elections in the United States. “The main challenge facing the world is that liberal democracies are going through a difficult time,” said the former Spanish president, emphasizing that “democracy, with all the problems it has, is the best system to govern. coexistence.” Their values are superior.” He then said that “after the fall of the Berlin Wall, it was believed that democracy had already won.” However, he continued, “Russia wants to return to what it was”. He then gave another example: “China, which is another dictatorship, has also taken an important step and has an important influence on other liberal democracies.” Populism and authoritarian drift “There is another enemy, which is populism, which is within the liberal democracies.” Rajoy said, emphasizing that “there was populism here, but also in Spain, with Podemos, to which the only thing that contributed was anger and the absence of ideas in favor of the Spanish people. ” Regarding Latin America, the former president affirmed that “there are three classic dictatorships: Cuba, Nicaragua and Venezuela.” But he also clarified that “there are other countries in which a certain authoritarian drift is manifested in attacks against the press and intervention in the judicial system.” This is all very dangerous and I won’t name names so as not to cause problems. The most serious thing, he said, is that “authoritarian countries continue to have influence here: in Cuba, in Venezuela.” And he continued: “China has considerable economic activity – in the region – and we also have Iran. » Later, Rajoy emphasized that “there are two groups: liberal democracies and BRICS. “We think Argentina should be in the first group.” For this reason, he stressed that the country of tango is not a member of this organization. On the other hand, Macri and Rajoy agreed on the importance of moving forward with the postponed free trade agreement between Mercosur and the European Union. At the start of his presentation, Macri did not hide his closeness to Rajoy and assured: “I always agree with Mariano.” The former Argentine head of state spoke of the difficult geopolitical situation. He discussed China’s case with Taiwan and also spoke about Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. He then spoke about migratory movements. “Madrid is perhaps the most dynamic capital in Europe,” said Macri, who dedicated a few words to Venezuela: “Something must be done to put an end to this dictatorship.” Regarding his opinion on the current Argentine head of state, Javier Milei, the former president confirmed that he continues to provide his support, but issued a warning: “Freedom is not synonymous with aggression . Before attending the Buenos Aires forum, Rajoy He”. made statements to the Argentine radio station Radio Miter. He talks about the situation in Valencia: “I am not going to use this misfortune which has affected so many people to criticize anyone. All I want is for this to stop, for us to look to the future and do everything we can to ensure this doesn’t happen again in the future. After declaring that he would not use DANA against President Pedro Sánchez, he claimed that his newspaper’s archives “are very solid.”
