{"id":835323,"date":"2026-03-19T02:52:16","date_gmt":"2026-03-19T02:52:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/835323\/"},"modified":"2026-03-19T02:52:16","modified_gmt":"2026-03-19T02:52:16","slug":"mexico-invites-spains-king-to-world-cup-in-sign-of-thaw","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/835323\/","title":{"rendered":"Mexico invites Spain\u2019s king to World Cup in sign of thaw"},"content":{"rendered":"<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">Spain\u2019s King Felipe VI has been invited to the 2026 World Cup in Mexico by President Claudia Sheinbaum, the royal palace said on Wednesday, signalling a thaw in relations between the two countries.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">Diplomatic relations have been strained since 2019, when the Mexican government demanded that the Spanish crown apologise for the abuses committed during the conquest and subsequent colonisation of the Americas in the 16th century.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">Sheinbaum excluded the king from her inauguration in October 2024 partly because Spain had not responded to the apology demand.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">Her invitation came after the king on Monday acknowledged that there had been \u201ca lot of abuse\u201d during the conquest of the Americas.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">\u201cThere are things that later, when we study them and learn about them, you say: \u2018Well, by today\u2019s standards and values, they obviously cannot make us feel proud,\u2019\u201d he added during a visit to an exhibition of Indigenous Mexican art in Madrid.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"Former Mexican president Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador reads a letter from 2019 addressed to Spain\u2019s King Felipe VI in September 2024. Photo: AFP\" data-qa=\"BaseImage-handleRenderImage-StyledImage\" class=\"e1gf69pb2 css-6ikqhs e445x7d0\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/7d2ee4b1-a653-4d8f-a9c9-f3272d152b84_2e003dfb.jpg\" title=\"Former Mexican president Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador reads a letter from 2019 addressed to Spain\u2019s King Felipe VI in September 2024. Photo: AFP\"\/>Former Mexican president Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador reads a letter from 2019 addressed to Spain\u2019s King Felipe VI in September 2024. Photo: AFP<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">The king made his informal observations as he commented on the exhibition in the presence of the Mexican ambassador to Spain, according to a video posted by the royal palace on social media.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Spain\u2019s King Felipe VI has been invited to the 2026 World Cup in Mexico by President Claudia Sheinbaum,&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":835324,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[5312],"tags":[1213,239451,943,42486,2000,299,5479,2132,72209,5338,2196,104,49,1514],"class_list":["post-835323","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-spain","tag-americas","tag-azteca-stadium","tag-canada","tag-claudia-sheinbaum","tag-eu","tag-europe","tag-madrid","tag-mexico","tag-mexico-city","tag-pedro-sanchez","tag-south-africa","tag-spain","tag-united-states","tag-world-cup"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/116253579233295738","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/835323","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=835323"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/835323\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/835324"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=835323"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=835323"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=835323"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}