Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum has downplayed warnings from her US counterpart, Donald Trump, about launching a ground attack against Mexican drug cartels, stating that “it’s part of his way of communicating,” amidst other similar warnings in the region and following the military intervention in Caracas that resulted in the capture of President Nicolás Maduro.
“Based on the statements President Trump has made, we believe it’s part of his way of communicating,” she said Friday at her morning press conference, although she also explained that she asked Foreign Minister Juan Ramón de la Fuente to address the issue with Secretary of State Marco Rubio.
“I asked Secretary Juan Ramón de la Fuente to meet with the Secretary of State, if necessary,” the president indicated, also leaving the door open to speaking with Trump “to strengthen cooperation.”
Sheinbaum took the opportunity to recall that “two or three days ago, Secretary Rubio himself spoke about the good coordination on security matters that exists with Mexico” and that she has “an agreement, an understanding on security issues” with President Donald Trump, according to the newspaper El Universal.
“There is an agreement with the Coast Guard and Northern Command for the Mexican Navy to be in charge of surveillance in our territorial waters. It’s an agreement that was reached a few months ago and has been working,” the president emphasized. “We don’t want to consider any other scenario,” she added.
In this regard, she explained that as part of this agreement, Mexican authorities are responsible, for example, for intercepting suspicious vessels “without the need for any use of force.”
In an interview Thursday with Fox News, Trump asserted that now was the time to “act against the cartels on the ground,” criminal organizations, he said, that “run Mexico.” “It’s very, very sad to see what has happened to that country,” he stated.
