The event was inaugurated on May 20 in Madrid with the “Dinner for Freedom”, an evening that marked the beginning of three days of idea exchange and proposal analysis. In his speech, Gutiérrez warned about the advance of populism and authoritarianism in Latin America and called for restoring trust in politics through integrity. He also evoked the moral and intellectual legacy of Mario Vargas Llosa in upholding the values of freedom and democracy across Ibero-America.
The following day, at the historic Ateneo de Madrid, Gutiérrez took part in the events organized by the Liberty and Democracy Group and the International Foundation for Freedom. There, he highlighted the shared commitment to building a free, institutional, and pluralistic Ibero-America. “We need to promote liberal principles in the face of ideological confusion affecting both the elites and the citizenry,” Gutiérrez told an audience of former presidents, lawmakers, writers, and scholars.
The summit’s central session took place on May 22 at the Teatro Campoamor in Oviedo, where Gutiérrez officially opened the 6th Citizen Convention before an audience of 1,300 attendees and two dozen media outlets.
In his speech in Oviedo, Gutiérrez was emphatic: “Freedom is a wounded word in Latin America. We live under the false freedom of despots, who distort it, manipulate it, and turn it into an instrument of subjugation.” In response to this decline, he announced the creation of the Permanent Academic Forum, a space to debate ideas and turn them into concrete proposals for the region.
To close the 6th Citizen Convention, a special tribute to Ibero-American migration was held at the Archivo de Indianos and Museo de la Emigración in Colombres, Asturias. There, Dionisio Gutiérrez raised the flag of Guatemala as a symbol of the historic bond between both sides of the Atlantic.
The event honored the memory of Ibero-American migrants as builders of identity and freedom—an emotional finale that reaffirmed the Encuentro’s spirit of integration.
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SOURCE Fundación Libertad y Desarrollo