US, Mexican and Canadian officials will meet during the next two days in Mexico City to talk about how to combat fentanyl trafficking and how to increase cooperation on immigration.
The objective of the meetings will be to advance the commitments that the three countries reached in recent months and reach new agreements to combat drug trafficking, curb the arrival of US weapons in Mexico and improve the situation of migrants, a senior US official told EFE.
According to that source, the US delegation will be led by Liz Sherwood-Randall, the main national security adviser to the President of the United States, Joe Biden, and who has already worked for the governments of Democrats Barack Obama (2009-2017) and Bill Clinton (1993-2001).
Sherwood-Randall will be joined by Biden’s senior adviser for drug control, Kemp Chester, and the acting assistant secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, Lisa Monaco, among other senior officials from different departments and agencies of the US Administration.
These talks are the result of the agreements reached in Mexico in January by Biden, the Canadian Prime Minister, Justin Trudeau, and the Mexican, Andrés Manuel López Obradorin the framework of what is known as the meeting of the “Three Amigos”, the informal designation of the Summit of North American Leaders.
At that summit, the three leaders agreed to create a specialized committee to combat trafficking in fentanyl, a powerful painkiller used to increase the potency of heroin and is currently responsible for the death of about 200 people a day in the United Statesaccording to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
This committee specialized in combating fentanyl trafficking they met for the first time in April at the White House and will hold their second meeting in Mexico between Monday and Tuesday.
On the other hand, with respect to migration, the objective of the United States is to advance in the agreements that already announced the May 2 Sherwood-Randall and López Obrador after a meeting in Mexico City.
Specifically, then both agreed to work together to combat human trafficking and increase legal pathways to migrate to the United States.
The Biden Government has promoted different measures to promote migration through legal channels and reduce the number of people who cross the border irregularly, for example with the creation of a two-year humanitarian permit for nationals of Venezuela, Cuba, Nicaragua and Haiti.
Finally, for Mexico, one of the priority topics of the meetings will possibly be arms trafficking from the United States.
According to estimates of the Mexican Executive, some 200,000 firearms from the United States end up in Mexico every year.