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European RoyalsSpain

King and Queen of Spain welcome Portuguese President during his state visit

King Felipe and Queen Letizia of Spain welcomed the Portuguese President Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa during his State Visit to Spain.

The Spanish King and Queen held an official reception ceremony at the Royal Palace of Madrid where both the Portuguese and Spanish national anthem was performed under a salvo of 21 guns. His Majesty the King and President Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa then reviewed the battalion of the Royal Guard who paid tribute.

© Casa de S.M. el Rey

After the greeting of the respective delegations, the parade of the Royal Guard ended the act.

At noon, the President of Portugal moved to the Palace of La Zarzuela where the King and Queen reside for a meeting with King Felipe over lunch.

During the evening, at a dinner gala offered at the Royal Palace of Madrid by the King and Queen to President Rebelo de Sousa, King Felipe spoke of the unity between Spain and Portugal and their shared values.

Stating, the “distinctive feature of our nations: our secular tendency to go beyond the local and transcend the global by combining all our energies” to affirm that “Spain and Portugal continue to defend this broad and open vision as well as our willingness to be at the head of a European project that rests on the most universal and advanced values in terms of political, social and economic rights”, and “that is based on the rule of law and the validity of the welfare state” he continued.

© Casa de S.M. el Rey

King Felipe also stressed that “we are good partners and friends in the European Union, in NATO and in the United Nations”, as well as the fact that “in the EU we are moving together to overcome the risks of the current stage, with the conviction that that only together we can give a renewed boost to the European project, but we are also Atlantic partners and we share in NATO the same objective of guaranteeing the necessary security of the European continent and our allies” he concluded.

This afternoon, King Felipe and President Rebelo De Sousa will visit the exhibition “Pessoa. All art is a form of literature ” which brings together a visual account of the Portuguese avant-garde scene that developed in the first half of the 20th century.

Tonight, President Rebelo de Sousa will attend a reception in his honour at the Royal Palace of El Pardo, the residence of the Portuguese President during his visit.

Tomorrow, King Felipe and President Rebelo de Sousa will travel to Salamanca to attend the fourth edition of the international event “Startup Olé 2018”, which connects entrepreneurs from around the world at the Archbishop Fonseca School of the University of Salamanca. Later, they will move to the Main School Building of the University, where they will preside over the solemn event to be held within the framework of the 800th anniversary of the University of Salamanca.