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Monday,
March 16, 2009
Mexican
President to the USA:
Mexico is not Ungovernable
By
Eduardo Ortega and Isabel
Becerril
· No one can explain how the United
States can be the largest
drug market in the world without the corruption of its authorities
El
Financiero, Mexico City – President Felipe
Calderón expressed deep regrets that U.S. authorities and the media
have
pursued a misleading campaign against Mexico on matters of
safety/security.
He bemoaned that there are magazines that are not only dedicated "to
attacking" and "lying" about the situation of our country, but
too they are dedicated to exalting criminals and making apologies for
crime.
Just a day before, Forbes
Magazine included the (Mexican) drug
trafficker Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman on its list of
multimillionaires, estimating his fortune at US$1 billion.
President
Calderón participated in the
"Mexico: Economic Outlook and Opportunities in the
New Global
Environment" forum, organized by ProMexico and the Council of the
Americas.
Speaking
before entrepreneurs, he classified
it as "false and absurd" that U.S. authorities may characterize the
Mexican government as not having authority over its national territory.
"I
challenge those who say that to tell
me where within (our) national territory they might want to go and I
will take
them. All I ask is don't come on vacation, which is how some analysts
apparently come to Mexico.
"What
I ask is that we go precisely to the place in the country they want, in
order
to be acquainted with the dominion of the state. We
do have
problems, of course, as too does the United States," he challenged.
He
assured that his administration has sufficient strength to defeat
crime, and it
enjoys the broad support of society.
The president emphasized that in the
United States no one is able to
explain how (it can be)
the largest drug market in the world without the
corruption of its authorities.
He criticized that while the Mexican
government is "cleaning
house" from top to bottom, in the U.S. high-level authorities are not
even
investigated.
Therefore, Calderón said that even
though he fully recognizes and values
recent statements of President Barack Obama, he hopes that (Obama is)
conveying
that sense of support and joint responsibility to the members of his
cabinet.
At the same time, he expressed
confidence that both the leadership and
the American media will assume their role of responsibility regarding
the
problem of drug trafficking.
He stressed that the minimum he is
calling for from Washington is a
sense of joint responsibility, because the problem of drug
transshipments
"consumes" the U.S. consumer society and impacts both sides of the
Rio Grande.
Moreover, Calderon expressed hope that
both (Mexico City) and the White
House would intervene in the matter of arms trafficking to Mexico.
The president said that with the
dissemination of (news) that there were
6,500 deaths in Mexico last year, the idea has been created that
Mexicans are
"collapsing" prostrate due to crime in the streets, and it is not so.
As well, he said police reports indicate
that 93 percent of those deaths
were directly or indirectly linked with organized crime gangs.
He added that with 30 per cent of those
deaths – of drug dealers,
informers, assassins or (money launderers), their bodies were never
claimed by
any family member.
In this regard, he explained that the
violence is caused by the fighting
between criminal groups for control of the market for drugs, which is
why his
government is mobilizing all of the strength of the state.
Furthermore,
he emphasized that – according to "serious research" – Mexico has a
10.7 rate of violent deaths per 100,000 inhabitants, a figure that is
lower
than those recorded in various cities in the United States.
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El
Financiero, Mexico City, March 13, 2009;
MexiData.info translation
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