Rhapsody is a ‘stitched song’: epic poems assembled in ancient Greece, popular airs and intertwined melodies, free music that united seemingly unrelated themes in Romanticism. The Hungarian musician Franz Liszt composed some famous rhapsodies. A Hungarian patriot of German origin -in Central Europe, identities formed a very complex mosaic- Liszt wanted to pay homage to Hungarian popular music with about twenty rhapsodies. Hungarian has been the music this week.
The finance ministers of Spain and Brazil, Arcadi España and Dario Durigan, held a meeting this Saturday, parallel to the progressive summit and the summit in defense of democracy held in Barcelona, to boost an initiative that both countries already agreed upon last July in Seville: The launch of an international coalition to tax the super-rich with a specific tax to address inequality and wealth concentration.
Mexico’s president, Claudia Sheinbaum, has denied that there has been a diplomatic crisis with Spain on account of Spain’s recognition of the suffering caused by the conquest of America. “There is no diplomatic crisis, there never has been. What is important is that the strength of the indigenous peoples for our homeland be recognized,” she explained upon her arrival at the IV Meeting in Defense of Democracy taking place in Barcelona this Saturday.
The IV Meeting in Defense of Democracy began this Saturday in Barcelona with a clear purpose: to present to the world strategic principles for combating the far-right wave that questions multilateralism and democracy, a current embodied by the US president, Donald Trump, whom no one mentions in this conclave but whose political action is very present. Led by the President of the Government, Pedro Sánchez, the meeting began with his intervention, in which he advocated for a “concerted action” by all progressive governments in the world in favor of “strengthening the alliance” that convenes them today, and combating “fear with more democracy, and inequality with more justice”. In the background of this commitment is the joint proposal to reform the UN due to its ineffectiveness in facing global challenges and acting in the face of the proliferation of international conflicts.
“It all started in Barcelona!”, Pedro Sánchez has assured will be remembered in the future. While a far-right international has been operating freely around the world for years, accelerated after Donald Trump’s return to the White House in January 2025, this Saturday a progressive international, convened by the head of the Spanish Executive and the president of Brazil, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, has started in the capital of Catalonia, as an alternative to the global reactionary wave and the new geopolitical and ideological order encouraged by the President of the United States.