Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador thanked Guatemala on Friday for serving to the practically 600 Mexicans who’ve crossed into Guatemala to flee drug cartel violence, but additionally minimized the violence that drove them there.
In his first feedback because the refugees fled earlier this week, the president went on so as to add that Mexico is a big nation, and like many different elements of the world, “there are conflicts.”
“Our (political) adversaries want to see that our government is unstable, that violence dominates and our country is being destroyed,” he mentioned. The Nationwide Guard would safe the world and the state of affairs would quickly be resolved, he mentioned.
A Guatemalan authorities report mentioned some 580 folks had fled violence within the Mexican state of Chiapas, together with males, ladies, kids and aged.
Households who crossed to the Guatemalan municipality of Cuilco mentioned shootouts had compelled them to flee and the cartels had made locals work checkpoints and used them as human shields whereas they battled their rivals.
Guatemalan President Bernardo Arévalo mentioned Wednesday his administration would coordinate the humanitarian response although there was little signal of it but. Arévalo mentioned his administration was working with the native governments close to the border to take care of the Mexicans, “who are escaping conflict between groups that is taking place on the Mexican side.”
Nonetheless, that was greater than got here from the Mexican facet, the place authorities didn’t reply to requests for remark concerning the state of affairs till Friday.
Two of Mexico’s strongest cartels from the northern states of Sinaloa and Jalisco have been battling for management of smuggling routes within the space of southern Mexico for greater than a 12 months inflicting a number of displacements.
In June, some 5,000 folks have been displaced by violence in one other a part of Chiapas after armed males set homes on hearth within the city of Tila.
In September final 12 months, Mexico’s president conceded the cartels had minimize off electrical energy in some Chiapas cities close to the border with Guatemala, and forbade authorities employees from coming into the largely rural space to repair energy strains.
