Calderon: corruption in the U.S. fuels drug trade

In an interview with the BBC before the G-20 summit last week, Mexican President Felipe Calderon responded to charges that his country is becoming a failed state. The president cautiously admitted that there is a drug problem, but placed most of the blame on his country’s geographic proximity to the world’s largest drug market: the ...

By , International Crisis Group’s senior analyst for Colombia.

In an interview with the BBC before the G-20 summit last week, Mexican President Felipe Calderon responded to charges that his country is becoming a failed state.

In an interview with the BBC before the G-20 summit last week, Mexican President Felipe Calderon responded to charges that his country is becoming a failed state.

The president cautiously admitted that there is a drug problem, but placed most of the blame on his country’s geographic proximity to the world’s largest drug market: the United States. More blame falls on the U.S. as well: for allowing weapons to flow across the border. And Calderon theorizes that U.S. corruption is also partly to blame. He theorizes that if corruption allows drugs on the Mexican side of the border, it also must be true that corruption in the U.S. has something to do with the continuing passage of narcotics into that country. Hmm. Does he have a point?

For all those pondering the much-talked-of question of Mexico’s stability, it’s a must watch.

Elizabeth Dickinson is International Crisis Group’s senior analyst for Colombia.

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