Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador and U.S. President Joe Biden. Photo: Twitter/ @BNNBreaking
Mexico City, July 11 (RHC)-- On Monday, Mexico's Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador (AMLO) announced that he will address the issue of security cooperation in the meeting he will have with U.S. President Joe Biden on Tuesday.
"The security issue will surely also be addressed. The relationship with the U.S. government is very good, always within the framework of respect for our sovereignty. Things have changed. Before there was the so-called Merida Plan, which violated our sovereignty," he said.
Although the AMLO-Biden meeting will focus on economy and migration, the dialogue will take place amid growing pressure from Washington for Mexico to stop the flow of synthetic drugs into the United States. It also occurs amid the progress of the legal claim that the Mexican government imposed against eleven U.S. arms manufacturers in August 2021.
AMLO affirmed that "it is no longer allowed" for the U.S. to order security operations such as the 2009 "Fast and Furious" operation, which involved the introduction of U.S. weapons to track down drug traffickers.
“There is cooperation and the sovereignty of our country is respected and that is how President Biden has understood it. We have to acknowledge and be thankful for that. So we don't have any problem and I hope the result will be good for both ou peoples," he said.
In 2020, Lopez Obrador enacted a reform to the National Security Act to restrict the presence of agents from U.S. security agencies such as the Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA). Currently, U.S. agents are still involved in security actions in Mexico but they do not direct field operations and intelligence.
"They continue to intervene. However, there is a law that has been respected and defines how many agents can stay in Mexico. It also establishes that they must submit report to our country and they cannot act on their own," AMLO explained.
On Tuesday, the Mexican president will hold a working breakfast with Vice President Kamala Harris before his meeting with Biden. In the afternoon, he will pay tribute to former President Franklin Delano Roosevelt for having been one of the "best" U.S. presidents and for having "respected" Mexico during the oil expropriation of the late 1930s.
Later Lopez Obrador will participate in a ceremony in honor of Martin Luther King. Before returning to his country on Wednesday, he will hold a meeting with businessmen from Mexico and the United States.
