Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador has rejected US Secretary of State Antony Blinken’s claim that parts of Mexico are controlled by drug cartelscalling the accusation “false”.
“There is no place in the country that does not have the presence of authorities,” López Obrador told reporters during a press conference on Friday.
The comment represents the latest effort by the Mexican president to allay mounting criticism in the United States about the power of drug cartels in Mexico, which US lawmakers and officials say have fueled an opioid epidemic in the country.
The recent cartel kidnapping of a group of US citizens who had crossed into northern Mexico has also fueled a Republican-led push that the US military intervene to address violence related to drug gangs in Mexico.
During a US congressional hearing on Wednesday, Blinken said it was “fair to say” that parts of Mexico were controlled by powerful drug gangs, not the government.
At Friday’s press conference, López Obrador responded: “That’s false.”
Two of the four Americans who were kidnapped in early March in the northern border city of Matamoros, as well as a Mexican bystander, were killed in the incident.
The Scorpions faction of the Gulf cartel later said it had handed over members of its own group who it said were responsible for the violence and issued an apology.
López Obrador, a leftist leader who ran on promises to end the country’s 12-year drug war, said the heightened US scrutiny of his government’s approach has been politically motivated ahead of the 2024 US election.
In March, he criticized Republican-led calls for the US military to intervene in Mexico, saying that Mexico City “was not going to allow any foreign government to intervene in our territory, let alone the armed forces of a foreign government to intervene.” ”.
“In addition to being irresponsible, it is an offense to the people of Mexico,” he said.
López Obrador also rejected the charge that Mexico is disproportionately fueling the region’s fentanyl epidemic, a claim Blinken repeated during testimony this week.
“I maintain that more fentanyl goes directly to the United States and Canada than to Mexico,” López Obrador said earlier this month, adding that although the fentanyl production laboratories were present in the country, the raw materials used to manufacture the drug came from Asia.
“I can tell Mr. Blinken that we are constantly destroying laboratories,” the Mexican leader said Friday.
Despite his campaign promises, López Obrador has been criticized for continuing what opponents call a renowned but still excessively militarized approach to drug cartels.
This has included the creation of a new national guard force to handle public security which has since been transferred under the control of the military.
Meanwhile, Mexico’s murder rate has remained high since López Obrador took office in 2018, with the country recording more than 31,000 violent homicides last year.
Earlier this week, López Obrador called State Department officials “liars” following an agency report that there was credible information in Mexico pointing to illegal or arbitrary killings by police, military and other officials. .
The report also detailed forced disappearances by government agents, as well as torture and inhumane treatment by security forces.
“Impunity and extremely low prosecution rates remained a problem for all crimes, including human rights abuses and corruption,” says the report, which also criticizes a increase in violence against journalists in Mexico.
“It’s not worth getting angry, that’s how they are,” López Obrador said, referring to State Department officials.
A State Department spokesperson responded to the president’s remarks by saying the agency stands by his report.
