MADRID — Struggling for more than a year to improve its troubled relations with Washington, Spain is investing big bucks in a new effort to expand Spanish business in the United States and enhance the Iberian country's image before the American public.
For President Bush, the Spanish government may still be in the doghouse since pulling its troops out of Iraq. But Spanish officials are determined to move beyond the bitterness and boost interest in exports, investment and more diversified tourism.
"We'd like to convert the United States into a stable market for our exports," Jose Montilla, Spain's minister for industry, commerce and tourism, said. Spain represents an economy relatively unknown in the U.S., both as a producer and an importer, he said.
Montilla spoke ahead of a mission he is heading this week to several U.S. cities, including Washington and Miami, to promote the Spanish "brand" as part of a $100-million "Plan USA." Spain, the promotion goes, is more than sun and Serrano ham: It also has scores of companies prepared to invest in technology, energy, pharmaceutical and other businesses in the United States.
Montilla said he also would be conveying a message from Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero that Spain would like "fluid relations" that increase and improve ties "in all fields."
"It is very important, both for Spain and the United States, to overcome the chill of the [recent] past," he said.
The political relationship between Madrid and Washington took a nose dive after the electoral victory of Zapatero and his Socialist party in March 2004, which ousted a right-wing government that had been especially friendly to the Bush administration.
Zapatero's first action was to make good on a long-standing campaign promise to remove Spanish troops from Iraq, to the overwhelming approval of Spaniards but the great irritation of Bush.
Eighteen months later, there has still been no one-on-one meeting between the two leaders, and rhetoric has been harsh. It got so bad at one point that Bush refused to take Zapatero's phone call of congratulations last year after the president won reelection.
In recent months, however, a series of fence-mending gestures have occurred on both sides.
Spain's defense and foreign ministers have been received in Washington by their counterparts, and a new, friendlier and Spanish-speaking U.S. ambassador took up residence in Madrid. Bush reportedly thanked Zapatero at this month's United Nations General Assembly for Spain's offers of help for Hurricane Katrina victims.
