Politics

López Obrador says US “satisfied” with Mexico’s fight against fentanyl

Mexico City, Oct 6 (EFE).- Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador said Friday that US officials were “satisfied and surprised” with Mexico’s fight against fentanyl during the High-Level Security Dialogue between the two countries.

“To put it briefly, US officials were delighted and surprised by the volume of drugs seized, by the number of laboratories destroyed, by the arrests, by the confiscation of weapons,” said the president in his daily press conference from Cancun.

Fentanyl trafficking was one of the main topics of the meeting with the Washington delegation formed by the Secretary of State, Antony Blinken; the Secretary of Homeland Security, Alejandro Mayorkas; the Attorney General, Merrick Garland, and the White House Advisor for Homeland Security, Elizabeth Sherwood-Randall.

At the meeting, Mexico reported the destruction of more than 2,000 synthetic drug laboratories since the beginning of López Obrador’s government in December 2018, as well as the seizure of 1,435.6 tons of precursor chemicals, 470 of methamphetamines, 184 of cocaine, 7.6 of fentanyl and more than 44,700 high-powered weapons.

For this reason, the Mexican president stated that US officials “have no doubts” about Mexico’s work against fentanyl.

“Secretary Blinken himself expressed this. He even said that they had no doubts about the work being done by the Mexican government to combat fentanyl,” he said.

In the press conference after the meeting, the Mexican government insisted that fentanyl is not produced in the country, but Washington officials maintain that Mexican cartels manufacture this synthetic drug.

“It was also clarified that the raw material for fentanyl is not produced in Mexico. It is brought and enters from Asia, and also arrives directly to the United States and Canada, precursors and everything used to elaborate these drugs,” López Obrador stressed.

Pressure from Washington for Mexico to control fentanyl is growing ahead of the presidential elections in both countries in 2024, mainly by Republican aspirants who are calling for using the US Army to fight cartels on Mexican territory and designating them as terrorists.

“There are already officials in the United States who talk about it being publicity. It is vulgar, common, cheap, cheap propaganda (of poor quality) to be threatening that they are going to invade us or that they are going to intervene to stop gangs in Mexico from the United States,” commented López Obrador. EFE

ppc/ar/ics

(photo)(video)

Related Articles

Back to top button