At Madrid’s Royal Palace on Monday evening, protocol carried an unmistakable political undertone. Morocco’s ambassador to Spain, Karima Benyaich, stood at the head of the line of accredited foreign envoys, wearing a green Moroccan caftan, as King Felipe VI and Queen Letizia hosted their annual reception marking Spain’s National Day.
The gathering, held the day after Madrid’s traditional military parade, drew more than a thousand guests to the royal residence. The King presided over the evening alongside the Queen and their daughters, Princess Leonor and Infanta Sofía, continuing a ceremony that has marked this date on Spain’s calendar for decades.
Positioned at the very front of the diplomatic corps, Benyaich greeted the royal family with a bow before taking her place among the first dignitaries received by the monarch. Her choice of attire, a green caftan with traditional embroidery, drew the attention of photographers and Spanish press covering the event, turning a routine diplomatic formality into a visual talking point.
The guest list underscored the scale of the occasion. Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez attended, alongside the Speaker of the Congress of Deputies, Francina Armengol, the President of the Senate, Pedro Rollán, several cabinet ministers, regional officials, senior judges, military commanders, party representatives, and prominent figures from business and culture.
The prominence given to Morocco’s envoy was no accident of seating. It comes at a time when relations between Rabat and Madrid, periodically tested by migration flows and the long-running dispute over the occupied enclaves of Ceuta and Melilla, are still described by both governments as strategic and stable. Moroccan diplomats read the gesture as confirmation that neither recurring friction nor outside pressure has dented the partnership.
Beyond the ceremony itself, the image of a Moroccan ambassador leading the diplomatic procession in Madrid captured, in a single frame, the message Rabat wants understood: a bilateral relationship anchored at the highest level of the Spanish state, regardless of regional turbulence.
