Obama in Mexico to Attend North American Leaders' Summit

[Judi Lynn]

Source: Washington Post

Obama in Mexico to Attend North American Leaders' Summit
By Cheryl W. Thompson
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, August 9, 2009; 4:58 PM

GUADALAJARA, Mexico, Aug. 9 -- President Obama is scheduled to arrive Sunday in Mexico's second-largest city for a two-day summit that will include discussions about that country's ongoing drug wars and whether its strategy to eliminate trafficking and the violence associated with it is working.

The North American Leaders' Summit is an annual gathering for the presidents of the United States and Mexico and the prime minister of Canada to work collaboratively on issues such as border security, immigration reform and economic recovery. It is Obama's second visit to Mexico since he became president and his second meeting with Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper, who is scheduled to visit the White House next month. Obama and Harper met in Ottawa in February and agreed to work together to fight the global economic recession.

But it is the drug war plaguing Mexico that has the leaders' attention. Since taking office in December 2006, President Felipe Calderón has struggled with ways to rid his country of cartels. He began an aggressive operation that included deploying 45,000 soldiers to fight the traffickers, and while it has had some success, the strategy has led to more than 12,000 drug-related deaths, hundreds of allegations of human-rights violations against the military and growing concerns in the United States about the effectiveness of Mexico's anti-drug strategy.

"One concern is the violence and, frankly, the ability of that government to exert control in certain cities," according to a White House official familiar with the matter.



Read more: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/08/09/AR2009080901566.html

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