Insufficient, fight against drug and arms trafficking

One year after Mexico and the United States established the Bicentennial Agreement on security, the results in terms of arms and drug trafficking are insufficient, recognized the US Secretary of State, Antony Blinken.

Within the framework of the High-Level Dialogue on Security for the Bicentennial Understanding, held in Washington, Blinken, together with the Secretary of Foreign Affairs, Marcelo Ebrard, the Secretary of Security, Rosa Icela Rodríguez, and other members of the delegations that participated in said meeting, offered part of the results of this agreement on security, Public Health and Safe Communities, held a year ago in Mexico City.

Assessing the US government’s performance, Blinken said his country has made significant new investments in drug use prevention, treatment and recovery.

However, he acknowledged that “we still have a lot of work to do,” because in terms of arms trafficking, he argued that both nations need to improve efforts to interrupt their flow since, last year, more than 33,000 people in Mexico were killed, more two-thirds with firearms.

“As you know, we criminalized, for the first time this year, illicit arms trafficking. That is a very important tool. The numbers in terms of seizures have increased significantly from a year ago,” he stated.

Arms sale

For his part, Foreign Minister Marcelo Ebrard presented a graph regarding the 10 counties where the greatest sale of weapons in the United States was detected, which would later enter Mexico.

Counties noted: Hartford, Connecticut with 1,656, Maricoapa, Arizona with 1,482, Harris, Texas with 1,156, Hampden, Massachusetts with 865, Pima, Arizona with 707, Los Angeles, California with 637, Dallas, Texas with 637, El Paso, Texas with 553, Bexar, Texas with 499 and Orange, Texas with 487 guns.

The foreign minister also detailed that 55,996 weapons had been seized in Mexico between January 2020 and September 2022, of which some 32,000 were intercepted before reaching the hands of organized crime.

Ebrard assured that the Security strategy was on the right track and that after creating a work team that would involve various levels of government and police, better results would be obtained in 2023.

New agreements

After the meeting, through a joint statement, Mexico and the US both countries indicated that during the next year, in order to redouble efforts to protect their citizens, prevent cross-border crime and persecute criminal networks, they will seek to implement 13 actions , among which stand:

Strengthen evidence-based prevention, treatment, and recovery programs.

Increase the number of municipalities in Mexico that employ crime prevention methods to target youth at risk and interrupt cycles of violence.

Reduce impunity for homicides and high-impact crimes through the use of data, analysis, prioritization, and task forces focused on the investigation of specific crimes.

As well as dismantling human smuggling organizations through coordinated efforts such as the Joint Task Force Alpha and with mechanisms that strengthen the exchange of information.

In addition to signing a Memorandum of Understanding for the exchange of information and the expansion of capacity in the processes of regulation and import of chemical products.

And prepare a collaborative report on arms trafficking to identify routes, organizations and tactics used to traffic arms; enforce the provisions of the bipartisan Safer Communities Act on firearms trafficking, among others.

Agreements after binational meeting

• More investment in health, safety and justice.

• Strengthen drug use prevention programs.

• Increase, in Mexico, crime prevention

• Reduce impunity through the use of data.

• Dismantle people smuggling organizations.

• Commit to a plan to curb the use and trafficking of synthetic drugs.

• Sign a memorandum to regulate chemical products.

• Increase access to eTrace and share best practices for prosecuting weapons-related cases.

• Prepare a collaborative report on arms trafficking and law enforcement.

• Increase the number of crime investigators.

• Develop a work plan to strengthen the security and cybersecurity infrastructure.

maritza.perez@eleconomista.mx