Medina Mora: Iguala was a “call for attention”

Mexico and the United States share a border more than 3,000 kilometers long and their bilateral trade merchandise is worth more than half a million dollars per minute. The United States has six million Mexican undocumented immigrants, the group that will benefit the most from Barack Obama’s executive actions. More than enough topics to fill up the agenda for the meeting between U.S. President Barack Obama and Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto that will take place in the Oval Office.

And if that’s not enough, there is the issue of cooperation on security especially now, as the spectre of the Iguala tragedy hangs over Mexico. The massacre took place on September 26, 2014 and led to the death of at least six people and to the abduction of 43 student teachers. And, in June 2014, 22 alleged drug dealers were killed by the Mexican army in Tlatlaya - an event that affected Mexico’s image abroad.

As Eduardo Medina Mora, the Mexican ambassador to Washington says in an interview to EL PAÍS, the two leaders will have a “full agenda.”

Question. Iguala and Tlatlaya have affected Mexico’s image abroad over the last year. Will these topics be on the agenda for the two presidents?

Answer. The agenda is comprehensive. It’s full. It will cover all issues, including security, where we have very close cooperation. We had these two very unfortunate events which really hurt Mexicans and the U.S. government has certainly shown an extraordinary disposition to cooperate in so far it can be useful to Mexico, and in particular, to highlight our bilateral commitment on this shared challenge. There are events that cause concern, just as there are in the United States. There have also been events in the United States that led to a disconnect with law enforcement as represented by the police and with respect to their behavior toward minorities, especially African-Americans and Latinos, like in Ferguson and New York.

The agenda for the United States and Mexico is full, it’s the agenda of North America"

Q. Is Ferguson comparable to Iguala?

A. Every country has its own circumstances based on its own things. What is important is to understand that those problems exist for each country and they must face them. In the case of Mexico, we know very well that - and President Peña Nieto put in his proposal to Congress - there is a need to strengthen security forces at the local level. The disintegration of municipal police forces is not adequate to match the evolution of organized crime.

Q. Has Iguala led to a review of bilateral cooperation efforts on security and the fight against organized crime within the framework of the Merida Initiative?

A. What President Peña Nieto has said is that this has come as a call for attention, that there was a weakness there but that is much more present in the municipal and state security forces, and that we need to make an additional effort to consolidate a more robust, bigger, institutional structure that responds better to these challenges. There is space for bilateral cooperation but it is in that context in which we can take up this issue, not so that it fills up the entire agenda. The agenda between the United States and Mexico is full, it’s the agenda of North America.

Q. What does Mexico expect from this meeting?

A. This is an opportunity to review all the progress we have made in bilateral integration, the results of the High Level Economic Dialogue which was announced in May 2013 in Mexico and which has been implemented, yielding very solid results in economic integration. This is an opportunity to review the agenda for training in human resources, cooperation on technology and innovation. And, of course, traditional issues like immigration, which is now very important after President Obama’s executive actions which obviously benefit a large number of Mexican citizens. There is also cooperation on border security, the agreement to work together on the flow of migrants from other countries who pass through Mexico en route to the United States, agreements that Mexico has signed with Central America.

Q. Will the presidents discuss US-Cuba efforts to normalize relations?

A. They will touch on it, but they will not exhaust it. We welcome the fact that countries very close to us, our sister Cuba, which is a close ally for Mexico, and the United States, our main partner, might come to a reasonable and adequate understanding for the future.

Q. Could Mexico help as a facilitator in normalizing relations?

A. We have cooperated in that way in the past and we applaud the news announced by both governments and we are waiting for additional steps toward normalization on economic matters as well, for the removal of the embargo. And we also have trilateral issues that we must take up. This issue of maritime borders, where one economic zone exclusive to one country ends and where the other begins, and how to divide this in the Gulf of Mexico, a shared space. There are all kinds of principles from the United Nations to help negotiate these borders. We have had agreements with Cuba since 1976 but now we must reach a new understanding between the three nations - a very complicated technical issue.

Translation: Dyane Jean François