{"id":67683,"date":"2026-10-07T21:50:13","date_gmt":"2026-10-07T19:50:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/?p=67683"},"modified":"2026-10-07T21:50:13","modified_gmt":"2026-10-07T19:50:13","slug":"latvia-will-celebrate-spains-national-day-with-a-military-parade-in-riga","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/2026\/10\/07\/latvia-will-celebrate-spains-national-day-with-a-military-parade-in-riga\/","title":{"rendered":"Latvia will celebrate Spain's National Day with a military parade in Riga"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Latvia is going through a very difficult time due to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/2026\/05\/29\/russia-is-already-preparing-for-an-attack-on-lithuania-latvia-and-estonia\/\">Kremlin threats<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/2026\/10\/07\/serious-border-incident-in-latvia-involving-armed-men-coming-from-belarus\/\">Belarus's migration war<\/a> against its borders.<!--more--><\/p>\n<p><rel><a href=\"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/2026\/10\/07\/serious-border-incident-in-latvia-involving-armed-men-coming-from-belarus\/\">Serious border incident in Latvia involving armed men coming from Belarus<\/a><\/rel><br \/>\n<rel><a href=\"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/2024\/11\/18\/the-spanish-participation-in-a-parade-in-latvia-with-soldiers-and-armoured-vehicles\/\">The Spanish participation in a parade in Latvia with soldiers and armoured vehicles<\/a><\/rel><\/p>\n<p>However, <strong>Latvia is not alone: \u200b\u200bthe country has been a NATO member since March 29, 2004<\/strong>. It joined the Atlantic Alliance on the same day as the other two Baltic states, Lithuania and Estonia. <strong>Thanks to the shield provided by NATO, Latvians have not had to endure the same fate as Georgia and Ukraine<\/strong>, which were invaded by Russia in 2008 and 2022, respectively. Following Russia's illegal annexation of Crimea and in light of the growing threat to European security posed by Russian expansionism, <strong>NATO deployed troops to the three Baltic states<\/strong>\u2014military contingents that initially consisted of a single battalion in each country but have since grown to the size of a brigade.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/live.staticflickr.com\/65535\/55575575779_8a26647399_o.jpg\" target=\"_blank\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/live.staticflickr.com\/65535\/55575575779_aa8b902fc0_z.jpg\" style=\"width:100%; height:auto; border:0px;\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p><strong>Spain is one of the countries contributing military personnel to NATO\u2019s Multinational Brigade in Latvia<\/strong>, which consists primarily of armored ground assets: main battle tanks, infantry fighting vehicles, self-propelled howitzers, and other support vehicles. <strong>The first Spanish military contingent arrived at the Latvian base of \u0100da\u017ei on November 19, 2017<\/strong>, and the Spanish Army has maintained an uninterrupted presence there ever since, helping to ensure the security of our Latvian allies.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/live.staticflickr.com\/65535\/55575575774_c89df12fe1_o.jpg\" target=\"_blank\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/live.staticflickr.com\/65535\/55575575774_232a39347e_z.jpg\" style=\"width:100%; height:auto; border:0px;\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Latvia recognizes the value of this allied support and wishes to express its gratitude. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mod.gov.lv\/lv\/zinas\/riga-notiks-spanijas-nacionalajai-dienai-veltits-pasakums\" target=\"_blank\">Yesterday, the Latvian Ministry of Defence announced that Riga will host an event dedicated to Spain's National Day<\/a>. <strong>This event will take place on Saturday, October 10, from 11:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m.<\/strong>, featuring a program that includes a wreath-laying ceremony and a military parade, complemented by an exhibition of military equipment. The Latvian Ministry of Defence noted:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p><em>\"<strong>At 11:00 a.m., the flags of Latvia and Spain will be raised in Freedom Square<\/strong>, followed by a ceremony honoring the fallen, a wreath-laying at the Freedom Monument, and <strong>a military parade featuring units from the Spanish Armed Forces<\/strong>. The event will be accompanied by music from the National Armed Forces Orchestra. <strong>During the parade, a specially trained unit will fire simultaneous, synchronized artillery salutes<\/strong>. Training ammunition will be used; this produces a brief noise but poses no threat.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Following the military parade, visitors are invited to view Spanish Armed Forces equipment in Br\u012bv\u012bbas Square<\/strong>, while around 12:00 noon, at 28 Ka\u013c\u0137u Street, <strong>there will be an opportunity to taste paella\u2014a traditional Spanish dish<\/strong>\u2014prepared in an army field kitchen.\"<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><strong>This event was organized by the Embassy of Spain in Latvia and the Spanish Armed Forces contingent stationed in Latvia<\/strong>, in cooperation with the Latvian Ministry of Defence, the Latvian National Armed Forces, and the Riga City Council. <strong>The Latvian Ministry of Defence highlighted the following:<\/strong><\/p>\n<blockquote><p><em>\"<strong>Spain is one of the 13 member states of the NATO Multinational Brigade in Latvia.<\/strong> This year marks nine years since the Spanish Armed Forces began serving in Latvia as part of the NATO Multinational Brigade. <strong>Over the years, the Spanish contingent has grown significantly, increasing from an initial 350 soldiers to more than 600<\/strong>, becoming the second-largest Allied force presence in Latvia.\"<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><strong>For years, Spanish soldiers in Latvia have been participating in various events in the country<\/strong>, including the military parades with which the Baltic state celebrates its independence anniversary every November 18.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/live.staticflickr.com\/65535\/54149869089_af8ce20e1b_b.jpg\" target=\"_blank\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/live.staticflickr.com\/65535\/54149869089_af8ce20e1b_z.jpg\" style=\"width:100%; height:auto; border:0px;\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p><strong>Currently, the Spanish military contingent in \u0100da\u017ei consists primarily of soldiers from the Brigade \"Guadarrama\" XII<\/strong>, based in El Goloso (Madrid). In addition, Spain contributes <b>a NASAMS Air Defense Unit (UDAA)<\/b> to the country; deployed at Lielv\u0101rde Air Base \u201450 km from Riga\u2014 this unit is staffed by personnel from the 94th Anti-Aircraft Artillery Regiment (RAAA 94), based in Las Palmas de Gran Canaria.<\/p>\n<p>---<\/p>\n<p><small>Photos: <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/AizsardzibasMin\/status\/2107431128449634431\" target=\"_blank\">Aizsardz\u012bbas Ministrija<\/a> \/ <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/EMADmde\/status\/1858604842689982723\" target=\"_blank\">Estado Mayor Defensa<\/a>.<\/small><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Latvia is going through a very difficult time due to Kremlin threats and Belarus&#8217;s migration war against its borders.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[19631,15961,11544,10373],"tags":[11254,18071,10707,28046,22841,16384,6013,11462,10557],"class_list":["post-67683","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-bloque-6-defense-eng","category-bloque-6-english","category-army","category-world","tag-adazi","tag-brigade-guadarrama-xii","tag-latvia","tag-lielvarde-air-base","tag-national-day-of-spain","tag-regimiento-de-artilleria-antiaerea-no94","tag-riga","tag-spain","tag-spanish-army"],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-10-15 00:31:55","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/67683","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=67683"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/67683\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=67683"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=67683"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=67683"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}