Secretary of State Hillary Clinton will visit Mexico January 24

Secretary of Sate Hilary Clinton has come to Mexico each year about this time. This article is interesting because is presents a Mexican point of view as to what the important issues are between the two countries: arms traffic, the NAFTA truck issue and anti-immigrant legislation in U.S. states.

Orignial in Spanish in El Universal (translated by AMB)

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton will visit Mexico January 24 at the invitation of Mexican Foreign Minister Patricia Espinosa. Clinton and Espinosa will meet in the city of Guanajuato (in the center of the country) to coordinate efforts in terms of competitiveness, infrastructure development and border cooperation against transnational organized crime.

The U.S. secretary of state and visited Mexico in March 2009 and 2010 to discuss various issues on bilateral relations and continue the dialogue begun by Presidents Felipe Calderón and Barack Obama.

Mexico has asked repeatedly for an US solution to the free sale of automatic weapons, as Mexican cartels take advantage of it to arm themselves, which has given them high firepower to face the Army and Police. In recent years, the U.S. - the biggest consumer of drugs in the world - has provided Mexico with arms, equipment and training for the war on drugs. This aid is valued at 1 billion 400 million dollars under the so-called Merida Initiative.

There has also been a heavy exchange of intelligence. Joined by close commercial and demographics ties, the two countries have, for several years, had a dispute regarding Mexican carriers being able to carry cargo to the United States.

The Mexican ambassador to Washington, Arturo Sharukan, this month stated that the priority of the Mexican diplomatic mission in 2011 is to face possible laws in the U.S. restricting the rights of undocumented immigrants, such as already approved in Arizona. Jan. 21, 2011