Weeks after the high-profile kidnapping of four Americans that gained global attention to Mexico’s security crisis, Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador is defending his country.
During a press briefing on Monday, Obrador said, “Mexico is safer than the United States. There is no issue with traveling safely through Mexico. That’s something the US citizens also know, just like our fellow Mexicans that live in the US,” CNN quotes.
When asked by a local reporter about security in Mexico, López Obrador noted that his country is popular among American tourists not only to visit but to live. “US government alerts say that it’s safe to only travel [in the states of] Campeche and Yucatan. If that were the case, so many Americans wouldn’t be coming in to live in Mexico City and the rest of the country. In the past few years is when more Americans have come to live in Mexico. So, what’s happening? Why the paranoia?”
Furthermore, the Mexican president also claimed there was “a campaign against Mexico from conservative US politicians that don’t want this country to keep developing for the good of the Mexican people.”
More On What Recently Happened In Mexico
As we previously reported, early this month, four Americans — Eric James Williams, Zindell Brown and cousins Latavia “Tay” McGee and Shaeed Woodard — drove into Matamoros, Mexico, which is in the northeastern state of Tamaulipas just south of Brownsville, Texas. Apparently, the men travels with Latavia so she could undergo a cosmetic procedure but never made it.
While en route, a gunmen opened fire on their vehicle. Following the shooting, the surviving Americans were kidnapped. Investigators believe the Americans were targeted by a Mexican cartel that likely mistook them for Haitian drug smugglers, the US official said. The US citizens have no concerning criminal history that has been identified by investigators, the official said.
Woodard and Brown were found dead and McGee and Williams were treated in a US hospital.
Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador confirmed the deaths during his press conference last week. The Tamaulipas governor also confirmed that one of the surviving citizens was wounded. The other was not.
At least one Mexican citizen died in the incident, according to Ken Salazar, the U.S. ambassador of Mexico said.