Mexico wants Spain to apologise for conquering the Aztecs

When Claudia Sheinbaum becomes Mexico’s first female president later today, Felipe VI, the King of Spain, will not be present. He has, very pointedly, not been invited to the swearing-in ceremony because he hasn’t apologised for Spain’s invasion and conquest of the Aztec empire 500 years ago. 

This diplomatic stand-off began in 2019 when Andrés Manuel López Obrador, then president of Mexico, wrote to King Felipe inviting him to express his regret. Having described the conquest as ‘tremendously violent, painful and unjustifiable’, López Obrador said, ‘Mexico would like the Spanish state to recognise its historical responsibility for these offences and to offer the appropriate apologies or political reparations.’

Felipe didn’t reply to that letter. By 2022 López Obrador was suggesting that Spain needed to learn to respect Mexico rather than regarding it as an ex-colony. Then last Thursday at his daily press conference the out-going president read out the four-page letter he sent five years ago and claimed that Felipe’s failure to reply showed high-handed arrogance.