|
José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero
José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero (; born 4 August 1960) is a Spanish politician and member of the Spanish Socialist Workers' Party (PSOE). He was the Prime Minister of Spain being elected for two terms, in the 2004 and 2008 general elections. On 2 April 2011 he announced he would not stand for re-election in the 2011 general election and left office on 21 December 2011. Among the main actions taken by the Zapatero administration were the withdrawal of Spanish troops from the Iraq war, the increase of Spanish troops in Afghanistan; the idea of an Alliance of Civilizations; the legalisation of same-sex marriage in Spain; reform of abortion law; a peace negotiation attempt with ETA; the end of ETA terrorism; increase of tobacco restrictions; and the reform of various autonomous statutes, particularly the Statute of Catalonia. Biography Family background and early life José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero was born in Valladolid, Castile and León, to Juan Rodríguez y García-Loz ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Excelentísimo Señor
The Most Excellent (Spanish: ''Excelentísimo Señor'' (male) or ''Excelentísima Señora'' (female), literally "Most Excellent Sir/Madam") is an honorific prefix that is traditionally applied to certain people in Spain and certain Spanish-speaking countries. Following Spanish tradition, it is an '' ex officio'' style (the holder has it as long as they remain in office, in the most important positions of state) and is used in written documents and very formal occasions. The prefix is similar (but not equal) to that of " His/Her Excellency", but in the 19th century "The Most Excellent" began to replace the former. The use of the prefix Excellency was re-introduced in Francoist Spain by '' Generalísimo'' Francisco Franco himself, who was formally styled as '' Su Excelencia el Jefe del Estado'' ("His Excellency The Head of State"), while his ministers and senior government officials continued using the prefix "The Most Excellent". The prefix "The Most Illustrious" (''Ilustrísimo/ ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Congress Of Deputies (Spain)
The Congress of Deputies ( es, link=no, Congreso de los Diputados, italic=unset) is the lower house of the Cortes Generales, Spain's legislative branch. The Congress meets in the Palace of the Parliament () in Madrid. It has 350 members elected by constituencies (matching fifty Spanish provinces and two autonomous cities) by closed list proportional representation using the D'Hondt method. Deputies serve four-year terms. The presiding officer is the President of the Congress of Deputies, who is elected by the members thereof. It is the analogue to a speaker. In the Congress, MPs from the political parties, or groups of parties, form parliamentary groups. Groups must be formed by at least 15 deputies, but a group can also be formed with only five deputies if the parties got at least 5% of the nationwide vote, or 15% of the votes in the constituencies in which they ran. The deputies belonging to parties who cannot create their own parliamentary group form the Mixed Group. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Alliance Of Civilizations
The United Nations Alliance of Civilizations (UNAOC) is an initiative that attempts to "galvanize international action against extremism" through the forging of international, intercultural dialogue, intercultural and interfaith dialogue, interreligious dialogue and cooperation. The Alliance places a particular emphasis on defusing tensions between the Western world, Western and Muslim world, Islamic worlds. The initiative was first proposed by the Prime Minister of Spain, José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, at the 59th General Assembly of the United Nations (UN) in 2005. It was co-sponsored by the Turkish Prime Minister, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. On 14 July 2005, United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan formally proclaimed the launch of the Alliance of Civilizations at the United Nations Headquarters with the co-sponsorship of the governments of Spain and Turkey. On 10 November 2009, the United Nations General Assembly recognized the mandate of the Alliance of Civilizations by ado ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Afghanistan
Afghanistan, officially the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan,; prs, امارت اسلامی افغانستان is a landlocked country located at the crossroads of Central Asia and South Asia. Referred to as the Heart of Asia, it is bordered by Pakistan to the Durand Line, east and south, Iran to the Afghanistan–Iran border, west, Turkmenistan to the Afghanistan–Turkmenistan border, northwest, Uzbekistan to the Afghanistan–Uzbekistan border, north, Tajikistan to the Afghanistan–Tajikistan border, northeast, and China to the Afghanistan–China border, northeast and east. Occupying of land, the country is predominantly mountainous with plains Afghan Turkestan, in the north and Sistan Basin, the southwest, which are separated by the Hindu Kush mountain range. , Demographics of Afghanistan, its population is 40.2 million (officially estimated to be 32.9 million), composed mostly of ethnic Pashtuns, Tajiks, Hazaras, and Uzbeks. Kabul is the country's largest city and ser ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Multi-National Force – Iraq
The Multi-National Force – Iraq (MNF–I), often referred to as the Coalition forces, was a military command during the 2003 invasion of Iraq and much of the ensuing Iraq War, led by the United States of America ( Operation Iraqi Freedom), United Kingdom ( Operation Telic), Australia, Italy (Operation Ancient Babylon), Spain and Poland, responsible for conducting and handling military operations. The MNF-I replaced the previous force, Combined Joint Task Force 7, on 15 May 2004, and was later itself reorganized into its successor, United States Forces – Iraq, on 1 January 2010. The Force was significantly reinforced during the Iraq War troop surge of 2007. As of May 2011, all non-U.S. coalition members had withdrawn from Iraq, with the U.S. military withdrawing from the country on December 18, 2011, thus, bringing about an end to the Iraq War. The United Nations Assistance Mission in Iraq, which does humanitarian work and has a number of guards and military observers, has als ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
2011 Spanish General Election
The 2011 Spanish general election was held on Sunday, 20 November 2011, to elect the 10th Cortes Generales of the Kingdom of Spain. All 350 seats in the Congress of Deputies were up for election, as well as 208 of 266 seats in the Senate. An election had not been due until April 2012 at latest, but a call by Prime Minister José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero for a snap election five months ahead of schedule was announced on 29 July 2011. Zapatero would not be seeking a third term in office, and with political pressure mounting, a deteriorating economic situation and his political project exhausted, an early election was perceived as the only way out. The election campaign was dominated by the effects of an ongoing financial crisis, high unemployment, a large public deficit and a soaring risk premium. Opinion polls had shown consistent leads for the opposition People's Party (PP) over the ruling Spanish Socialist Workers' Party (PSOE), whose popularity had plummeted after Zapatero's ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
2008 Spanish Legislative Election
The 2008 Spanish general election was held on Sunday, 9 March 2008, to elect the 9th Cortes Generales of the Kingdom of Spain. All 350 seats in the Congress of Deputies were up for election, as well as 208 of 264 seats in the Senate. After four years of growing bipolarisation of Spanish politics, the election saw a record result for both ruling Spanish Socialist Workers' Party (PSOE) and opposition People's Party (PP), together obtaining more than 83% of the vote share—over 21 million votes—and 92% of the Congress seats. The PSOE under José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero benefitted from tactical voting against the PP and emerged as the most-voted party just 7 seats short of an overall majority. On the other hand, Mariano Rajoy's PP saw an increase in its vote share and seat count but remained unable to overtake the Socialists. United Left (IU) had its worst general election performance ever with less than 4% and 2 seats. Regional nationalist parties Convergence and Union (CiU), ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
2004 Spanish Legislative Election
The 2004 Spanish general election was held on Sunday, 14 March 2004, to elect the 8th Cortes Generales of the Kingdom of Spain. All 350 seats in the Congress of Deputies were up for election, as well as 208 of 259 seats in the Senate. The electoral outcome was heavily influenced by the aftermath of the Madrid train bombings on 11 March, as a result of which all parties suspended their electoral campaigns. For two days following the attacks, the People's Party (PP) government kept blaming the terrorist organization ETA for the bombings, even in spite of mounting evidence suggesting the involvement of Islamist groups. The government was accused of misinformation, as an Islamist attack would have been perceived as the direct result of Spain's involvement in the Iraq War, which had been highly unpopular among the public. The election result was described by some media as an "unprecedented electoral upset". The perceived abuse of the PP's absolute majority throughout the legislature ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Spanish People
Spaniards, or Spanish people, are a Romance ethnic group native to Spain. Within Spain, there are a number of national and regional ethnic identities that reflect the country's complex history, including a number of different languages, both indigenous and local linguistic descendants of the Roman-imposed Latin language, of which Spanish is the largest and the only one that is official throughout the whole country. Commonly spoken regional languages include, most notably, the sole surviving indigenous language of Iberia, Basque, as well as other Latin-descended Romance languages like Spanish itself, Catalan and Galician. Many populations outside Spain have ancestors who emigrated from Spain and share elements of a Hispanic culture. The most notable of these comprise Hispanic America in the Western Hemisphere. The Roman Republic conquered Iberia during the 2nd and 1st centuries BC. Hispania, the name given to Iberia by the Romans as a province of their Empire, became highly acc ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
University Of León
The University of León is a Spanish public university with campus in León and Ponferrada. The university is found in 1843, when it was created the Normal School for Teachers or Masters Seminar of Public Instruction and the subaltern school of Veterinary Medicine, founded in 1852, laying the foundations of Leon future university. Founded in 1979 as a splitting of the University of Oviedo, from the various schools and colleges that depend on that, more or less existed long ago in the city of Leon. In recent years the university has signed important cooperation agreements, among which the one signed with the University of Washington, which has allowed the installation in Leon of the second European Headquarters this university to learn Spanish, with capacity for 500 students, and signed with the Xiangtan University, which has led to the establishment in the city of Confucius Institute Confucius Institutes (CI; ) are public educational and cultural promotion programs funded a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sonsoles Espinosa
Sonsoles Espinosa Díaz (born 8 November 1961) is a Spanish classical singer and music teacher. She is married to José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, former President of the Government (''Presidente del Gobierno''. Biography She was born in Ávila, the daughter of a military officer, and received a law degree from the Universidad de León. She met Rodríguez Zapatero in León in 1981. They married on 27 January 1990 and have two daughters, born in 1993 and 1995. Sonsoles is a soprano and music teacher, and several times she stated she loves singing soft rock music. While living in León, she was a member of the city's prestigious university choir and used to be a music teacher for seven to nine pupils at one of León's and Spain's most prestigious schools, Colegio Leonés. Since moving to Madrid she has continued to sing, as a substitute member of the chorus at the city's opera house, the Teatro Real, and more recently with the choir of the government-owned broadcasting service RTVE ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Castile And León
Castile and León ( es, Castilla y León ; ast-leo, Castiella y Llión ; gl, Castela e León ) is an autonomous community in northwestern Spain. It was created in 1983, eight years after the end of the Francoist regime, by the merging of the provinces of the historic region of León: León, Zamora and Salamanca with those of Castilla La Vieja (Old Castile): Ávila, Burgos, Palencia, Segovia, Soria and Valladolid. The provinces of Santander and Logroño, which until then had formed part of Castile, opted out of this merger and formed the new Autonomous Communities of Cantabria and La Rioja respectively. Castile and León is the largest autonomous community in Spain in terms of area, covering 94,222 km2. It is however sparsely populated, with a population density below 30/km2. While a capital has not been explicitly declared, the seats of the executive and legislative powers are set in Valladolid by law and for all purposes that city (also the most populated municipali ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
_logo.png "Click for more on -> Alliance Of Civilizations"){kind=logo}
.svg "Click for more on -> Afghanistan")
.jpg "Click for more on -> 2004 Spanish Legislative Election")
.svg "Click for more on -> Castile And León")