Mexican President Felipe Calderon on Wednesday hit back at accusations his government was failing in the fight against violent drug cartels, saying that corruption in the US was also to blame.
With murders among feuding Mexican drug cartels on the rise and continued ravenous demand for cocaine and other illegal drugs north of the border, Calderon said the US should take a hard look at itself before pointing the finger at anyone else.
“The main cause of the problems associated with organized crime is having the world’s biggest consumer next to us,” Calderon said in an interview.
“Drug trafficking in the United States is fueled by the phenomenon of corruption on the part of the American authorities,” he said, calling on US President Barack Obama to step up the fight against drugs in his own country.
Calderon admitted some Mexican officials had helped cartels, but urged the US to consider how many of its officials have been implicated.
“I want to know how many American officials have been prosecuted for this,” he said, listing a string of prosecutions made against Mexican police officers and government officials during his administration.
“It is not an exclusively Mexican problem, it is a common problem between Mexico and the United States,” he said.
Although cocaine is largely produced in South America, Mexican cartels control much of the multi-billion-dollar trade, transporting the drug to consumers in the US.
Since taking office in late 2006, Calderon has launched a wide-ranging crackdown on drug cartels, often with bloody repercussions, as cartels hit back with ever-higher levels of violence and intimidation.
Some 5,300 people were murdered in drug violence across Mexico last year. Ciudad Juarez, across from El Paso, Texas, was worst hit, with more than 1,600 drug-related deaths reported.
Mexico’s ill-equipped police and security forces are often out-gunned by the well-armed gangs.
The administration of former US president George W. Bush pledged US$1.6 billion over three years in security assistance to Mexico and Central America, primarily aimed at better equipping Mexico’s security forces.
To even the playing field further, Calderon called on US officials to do more to stem the flow of weapons from the US to Mexico, a route often used by traffickers to acquire arms.
“The biggest empowerment of organized crime are the weapons that arrive from the United States,” the president said.
“Since 2006 we have decommissioned 27,000 arms, everything from missile launchers to 2,500 grenades. We have also found uniforms and arms belonging to the US Army,” Calderon said.
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