Mexican President Felipe Calderon hopes to quell Mexico’s rampant drug violence by the end of his term in 2012, and disputes US fears that Mexico is losing control of its territory.
In interviews with reporters on Thursday, Calderon and his top prosecutor said the violence that killed 6,290 people last year — and more than 1,000 in the first eight weeks of this year — is a sign that the cartels are under pressure from military and police operations nationwide, as well as turf wars among themselves.
“To say that Mexico is a failed state is absolutely false,” Calderon said. “I have not lost any part — any single part — of Mexican territory.”
Calderon, a Harvard-educated conservative, said smuggling could not be eliminated as long as Americans continue to use drugs, but hopes he can beat back the cartels by 2012 to a point that the army and federal police can withdraw and leave the problem in the hands of local law enforcement.
He declined to give a specific timeline for winning the war against drug gangs.
Calderon easily switched between English and Spanish in an hour-long interview at the colonial National Palace. Sitting in a chair decorated with Mexico’s national symbol — an eagle perched on a cactus devouring a serpent — he was relaxed and jovial.
Mexico had bristled when the US Joint Forces Command put it on par with Pakistan, saying both were at risk of “rapid and sudden collapse.”
That and other reports have put a global spotlight on Mexico’s growing violence and pressured Calderon to change tactics.
He said on Thursday that wasn’t an option.
“Yes, we will win,” he said, “and of course there will be many problems meanwhile.”
Calderon sent the army and federal police out into drug strongholds on his first day in office in December 2006, promising to turn a tide in a war that was seeing increasingly brazen tactics such as beheadings, assassinations and the attempt to control local governments.
Since then, Mexico has spent US$6.5 billion on top of its normal public security budget, but that falls short of the US$10 billion Mexican drug gangs bring in annually, Mexican Attorney General Eduardo Medina Mora said in another interview on Thursday.
But violence has increased, more than doubling Last year. Medina Mora said that does not reflect the drug gangs’ power; “It is reflecting how they are melting down.”
As proof, he said street prices of cocaine in the US have doubled in the last three years, while purity has dropped by 35 percent. He said the government has crippled Mexico’s methamphetamine trade by banning precursor chemicals.
Medina Mora predicted Mexico was “reaching the peak” of the violence, adding that the government’s goal was to make smuggling through Mexico so difficult that the drug gangs are forced to look elsewhere.
“We want to raise the opportunity cost of our country as a route of choice,” he said.
Even as he spoke, five more suspected drug killings were announced by authorities in the Pacific coast state of Guerrero. The men were shot on Wednesday night.
Medina Mora said 90 percent of the dead were involved in the drug trade, while only 4 percent were innocent bystanders. The rest — some 800 to date — were police officers and soldiers.
Both Calderon and Medina Mora called on the US to do more, by stopping the flow of powerful US assault weapons and mountains of drug cash into Mexico. Calderon, whose government has arrested more than 25 high-level officials for suspicion of taking drug bribes, also called for the US to purge its own corrupt officials.
“I’m fighting corruption among Mexican authorities and risking everything to clean house, but I think a good cleaning is in order on the other side of the border,” he said.
Calderon applauded cross-border efforts that the US said culminated this week with the arrests of 755 Sinaloa cartel members and seizure of US$59 million in criminal proceeds in the US.
But he acknowledged that Mexico cannot be the top US priority, saying US President Barack Obama would help Mexico most by fixing his own economic crisis.
He expressed optimism that Obama would improve relations in the region, saying Latin American leaders have high expectations for his first trip to the region at the Summit of the Americas in April.
“President Barack Obama has a tremendous opportunity to recover the leadership of the United States,” he said.
OPTIMISTIC: A Philippine Air Force spokeswoman said the military believed the crew were safe and were hopeful that they and the jet would be recovered A Philippine Air Force FA-50 jet and its two-person crew are missing after flying in support of ground forces fighting communist rebels in the southern Mindanao region, a military official said yesterday. Philippine Air Force spokeswoman Colonel Consuelo Castillo said the jet was flying “over land” on the way to its target area when it went missing during a “tactical night operation in support of our ground troops.” While she declined to provide mission specifics, Philippine Army spokesman Colonel Louie Dema-ala confirmed that the missing FA-50 was part of a squadron sent “to provide air support” to troops fighting communist rebels in
PROBE: Last week, Romanian prosecutors launched a criminal investigation against presidential candidate Calin Georgescu accusing him of supporting fascist groups Tens of thousands of protesters gathered in Romania’s capital on Saturday in the latest anti-government demonstration by far-right groups after a top court canceled a presidential election in the EU country last year. Protesters converged in front of the government building in Bucharest, waving Romania’s tricolor flags and chanting slogans such as “down with the government” and “thieves.” Many expressed support for Calin Georgescu, who emerged as the frontrunner in December’s canceled election, and demanded they be resumed from the second round. George Simion, the leader of the far-right Alliance for the Unity of Romanians (AUR), which organized the protest,
ECONOMIC DISTORTION? The US commerce secretary’s remarks echoed Elon Musk’s arguments that spending by the government does not create value for the economy US Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick on Sunday said that government spending could be separated from GDP reports, in response to questions about whether the spending cuts pushed by Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency could possibly cause an economic downturn. “You know that governments historically have messed with GDP,” Lutnick said on Fox News Channel’s Sunday Morning Futures. “They count government spending as part of GDP. So I’m going to separate those two and make it transparent.” Doing so could potentially complicate or distort a fundamental measure of the US economy’s health. Government spending is traditionally included in the GDP because
Hundreds of people in rainbow colors gathered on Saturday in South Africa’s tourist magnet Cape Town to honor the world’s first openly gay imam, who was killed last month. Muhsin Hendricks, who ran a mosque for marginalized Muslims, was shot dead last month near the southern city of Gqeberha. “I was heartbroken. I think it’s sad especially how far we’ve come, considering how progressive South Africa has been,” attendee Keisha Jensen said. Led by motorcycle riders, the mostly young crowd walked through the streets of the coastal city, some waving placards emblazoned with Hendricks’s image and reading: “#JUSTICEFORMUHSIN.” No arrest
RSS