Agustín Santos Maraver, Spanish ambassador to the United Nations, will be Yolanda Díaz’s number two in the lists of Sumar por Madrid | General Election 23J | Spain

Agustín Santos Maraver (Los Angeles, 67), Spanish ambassador to the United Nations, will be Yolanda Díaz’s number two on the Sumar lists for Madrid. The second vice president of the government was looking for a profile outside her political space for this post and in recent weeks various rumors have indicated a prestigious independence from the socialist orbit, although the diplomat has also maintained close ties with Izquierda Unida for some time. many years. Santos Maraver, who has held the position of Ambassador Permanent Representative of Spain to the United Nations in New York since 2018, was also the cabinet director of the Minister of Foreign Affairs Miguel Ángel Moratinos during the second government of José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, between 2008 and 2011, and much earlier, adviser to the diplomatic department of La Moncloa, with Felipe González.

“I have great professional respect for him. The Sumar project comes out a winner. In this case, not only with the institutionality of what the Spanish ambassador to the UN represents, but also [lo] which is the defense of human rights, the defense of multilateralism…”, Díaz reacted this Monday in statements to the media in Luxembourg, where he participates in the meeting of the Council for Employment, Social Policy, Health and Consumers, reports Manuel V. Gomez.

On Tuesday, the Council of Ministers intends to approve his dismissal as ambassador. His appointment, which Cadena SER anticipated and EL PAÍS was able to confirm, was made public just three days after an unprecedented coalition agreement was signed between 16 parties from the left-wing ideological spectrum to participate together in the general election next July 23. And at the beginning of the week in which Díaz tries to move on after the tension unleashed by the tough negotiations, especially with Podemos.

Other well-known faces from politics in recent years will also be on the ballot for Madrid, which Díaz herself will preside over. Numbers three and four correspond to Más Madrid and Más País (Sahrawi activist Tesh Sidi and Íñigo Errejón). Podemos general secretary Ione Belarra occupies fifth place in lists that do not include the party’s number two, Irene Montero, whose participation last week became a major obstacle and caused profound disruption within the organization founded by Pablo Iglesias, who openly criticized its exclusion.

Sumar’s sources highlight Santos Maraver as a figure who brings “the belief that multilateral cooperation is essential to solve the imminent challenges of the future: climate change, the unequal growth of social and gender inequalities, debt problems and an economic model unsustainable”. . In the team of the second vice president, they believe that it is “necessary” to establish a “bridge between local and national debates” to situate them in the global context and provide them with “viable, democratic and sustainable solutions”, something to which their integration into the project.

The current Ambassador of Spain to the United Nations participated in the student movement against Francoism, being a representative of the Faculty of Philosophy and Letters of the Complutense University. He studied Philosophy and Letters and Political Science and Sociology. In 1982 he entered the diplomatic career and was assigned to the embassies of Beijing, Havana, Washington —where he closely followed the peace negotiations in Central America— and Canberra. He was also assigned to the Representation of Spain before the European Union and was Consul General in Cape Town and Perpignan, where he devoted particular attention to the recovery of the Democratic Memory of the Republican exile. He has been Ambassador of Spain to the International Organizations and Institutions of the United Nations in Geneva and since 2018 Permanent Representative of Spain to the United Nations, a position he held until his termination to participate in the Sumar project.

In Madrid, he was chief of cabinet of the Spanish Agency for Development Cooperation, adviser in the diplomatic department of La Moncloa with President González, parliamentary adviser and chief of cabinet of Miguel Ángel Moratinos in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, during the government of José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero.

The parliamentary spokesman of the United Left, Enrique Santiago, highlighted his “progressive profile” and “anti-Franco fighter” in an interview earlier this Monday on RNE. The election of Santos Maraver, he said, “demonstrates that there are no ministries beyond Sumar’s reach.”