Letter from Buenos Aires - no 5.

Its been a hectic week here in Buenos Aires with the usual suspects hogging the headlines. Xiomara and I were surprised about one, the Foreign Minister, Diana Mondino.

After announcing the resumption of flights from Córdoba to the Malvinas following her earlier discussions with UK Foreign Secretary David Lammy, Diana Mondino attended the UN meeting in New York concerning the 1959 USA sanctions on Cuba. There she disobeyed Javier Milei by voting against the trade embargo, leaving only the USA and Israel in support. On her return Milei sacked her.

Milei immediately recalled the Argentine Ambassador to Washington, Gerardo Werthein to take her place. On Monday he took his oath of office on the Torah. Werthein has been ordered to slash the Foreign Office budget and purge all non-Libertarians from his department, including Paola Di Chiaro who heads Malvinas area. Presidential Advisor Santiago Caputo and Presidential Secretary Karina Milei are to take care of the rest of them. Xiomara and I were brought in to discuss their cost-saving plans to replace diplomatic consulates with National Agencies on the Swedish model, whereby the mission would cover more than one nation.

We reported earlier on the crisis between Argentina and Spain after Javier Milei had accused the wife of Spain’s Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez of being ‘a criminal’. It looks as if Deputy President Victoria Villarruel’s visit must have charmed the nation as Joaquín María de Arístegui Laborde is to be appointed the new Ambassador to Buenos Aires, to top-up the Spanish diplomatic mission.

The Association of State Workers (ATE) launched a 36-hour strike on Tuesday to protest against spending cutbacks and wages that are not in keeping with inflation.