During the broadcast of the October 12th military parade that TVE aired yesterday, there was one of those moments when the history of Spain explains the present.

A year ago, the image illustrating this piece would have been impossible. It is from June 25, when half the world was watching the football World Cup, which was being held, in part, in Mexico. The country's president, Claudia Sheinbaum, and Felipe VI appear in it, and it was taken during the Spanish monarch's visit to the National Palace of the Latin American country, in a meeting that was "very cordial," according to the Mexican leader. It represented the culmination of a process of rapprochement between the Spanish crown and Mexico, and left behind years of tensions over the Spanish colonial past after some advances that remain far from the demands that motivated the clash.

"Forgiveness magnifies both the one who offers it and the one who grants it." These were the words of Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum in February of this year. She was referring to the pardon that Mexico has formally demanded from Spain since 2019 for its colonial past and for the excesses committed during the conquest of the Americas. This request for an apology sparked a clash with the Spanish royal family and government a year ago, when Sheinbaum failed to invite King Felipe VI to her inauguration after the monarch failed to respond. a letter from his predecessorAndrés Manuel López Obrador, asking for this pardon. The Spanish government dodged this request and, considering it "inexplicable" that the monarch was not invited, did not attend the event despite having been invited. A year later, and after the Mexican president reiterated several times that an apology was needed, the Spanish government, when questioned by the ARA on the matter, avoided commenting, and Sumar, the minority partner, limited itself to showing "the utmost respect and sensitivity to the demands for historical memory" of Latin American states.

In 1892, 400 years after Christopher Columbus set foot in America, it was the first time that 12 October was marked on the calendar as Spain's national holiday. The choice was consolidated with the restoration of democracy, after during Franco's regime this holiday had been put on the back burner because the regime had promoted the date of 18 July. The decree law of 1987 justified the 12 October choice due to the fact that it "symbolises the historical event" in which Spain "begins a period of linguistic and cultural projection beyond the European borders". The colonisation of the American continent marked a before and after in the history of humanity but, like all historical events, it has its lights and shadows.