Crime
Mexico urges China to help fight fentanyl production and smuggling
The letter asks Xi to provide Mexico with information about when and where fentanyl was being shipped from China to Mexico, as well as how much of the drug was being transported and by whom
April 5, 2023 8:35am
Updated: April 5, 2023 9:26am
Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador said on Tuesday he sent a letter to Chinese President Xi Jinping urging him to help tackle fentanyl production.
During a news conference, Lopez Obrador read the letter he sent to Xi Jinping on March 22, in which he asked him to help curb the supply of the drug that is entering his country.
"We come to you, President Xi Jinping, not to ask for your support in the face of these rude threats, but to request that for humanitarian reasons, you help us control shipments of fentanyl that can be sent from China to our country," Lopez Obrador read.
In addition, the letter asks Xi to provide Mexico with information about when and where fentanyl was being shipped from China to Mexico, as well as how much of the drug was being transported and by whom.
Lopez Obrador said he wrote the letter after a recent visit from U.S. lawmakers, who suggested he speak to China to help address the fentanyl crisis that has taken over both countries.
The Mexican president denies the claim that fentanyl is not being produced in Mexico. However, fentanyl laboratories have recently sprung up in Mexico, in which drugs shipped from China are being mixed with other substances, he claimed.
Lopez Obrador said that fentanyl was an American problem caused by the country’s lack of family values, and accused U.S. legislators of threatening Mexico over the drug trade.
“There is a lot of disintegration of families, there is a lot of individualism, there is a lack of love, of brotherhood, of hugs and embraces,” Amlo said. “That is why they [US officials] should be dedicating funds to address the causes.”
“Unjustly, they are blaming us for problems that in large measure have to do with their loss of values, their welfare crisis,” López Obrador wrote to Xi in the letter. “These positions are in themselves a lack of respect and a threat to our sovereignty, and moreover they are based on an absurd, manipulative, propagandistic and demagogic attitude.”
It is not immediately clear if Xi Jinping received the letter or responded to it.
