SPAIN apologised on Monday for its part in the events that led Bolivian President Evo Morales’ plane to be delayed earlier this month during an international search for US fugitive Edward Snowden.

“We recognize publicly that perhaps the procedures used in the Vienna airport by our representative were not the most effective,” Spain’s ambassador to Bolivia, Angel Vázquez, told journalists after dropping the letter off at Bolivia’s Foreign Ministry.

“We regret this fact… the procedure was not appropriate and bothered the president (Morales), putting him in a difficult situation,” Vázquez said.

Spain’s Foreign Minister Jose Manuel Garcia-Margallo said last week that the country was ready to apologize to Bolivia for inconveniencing Morales, but denied it had closed its airspace to his flight.

Spain is keen to maintain historical ties to South America, a growing export market, and has renewed efforts to nurture relationships with Latin America after expropriations last year by Bolivia and Argentina hit Spanish companies.

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9 COMMENTS

  1. Spain “denied it closed it’s airspace to Morales’ flight”
    So what are they apologising for? The reason of course, lies in the final paragraph of this piece. They aren’t apologising, they are squirming with embarrassment and fear, of losing yet more business in South America. BUT Los Estados Unidos rules the world. How do they square THAT circle?

  2. You’re up his @rse stefanjo! HE’S the OBSESSED negative one noone can swat away like a pesky fly. Your new best friend! Continually looking for ways to being things down ALL over this website. It is damaging and probably puts people off reading.

  3. Fred might be right a lot of the time Stefanjo – at putting everything in Spain down. This isn’t exactly a worthwhile, constructive or clever trait to have is it.

    With a country that has many problems it’s very easy to do. You just don’t get it do you. I’ll leave you guys to it!

    swat swat swat

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