Mexico and the United States will increase data sharing to better curb the flow of synthetic drugs including fentanyl, senior Biden administration officials say.
The two nations have also committed to a suite of actions that will enhance their ability to jointly track and counter the trafficking of drugs, firearms, and human beings.
The agreements are part of a wider effort “to facilitate action against criminal organizations that traffic people, guns, and illicit drugs, including fentanyl into our communities,” the officials said during a Feb. 8 press call.
“We all agreed that this is a shared threat not only for us countries in North America but around the globe,” one official said.
The bilateral engagement came on the sidelines of the fourth meeting of the Trilateral Fentanyl Committee, a forum established by Canada, Mexico, and the United States to guide priority actions to address the illicit fentanyl trade in North America.
There, Homeland Security adviser Liz Sherwood-Randall led a security delegation that met with Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador and members of the Mexican security cabinet.
“It was a long and substantive discussion on a range of topics and incredibly productive and constructive from our perspective,” one official said.
“We agreed to two concrete steps to increase information and data-sharing between the United States and Mexico.”
More than 100,000 Americans die every year in the drug epidemic that has ravaged the United States for years.
Opioid-related overdose deaths have skyrocketed over the past decade.
One official acknowledged that about 110,000 Americans died from drug overdoses in the past year, with about 70 percent of those deaths stemming from synthetic drugs including fentanyl.
Those numbers appear to have peaked, the official said, but aren’t yet coming down.
“We have seen the numbers flatten, I would say, so we are hoping that will lead to a decline,” the official said.
US–Mexico Relationship Has Grown Tense
To that end, the official highlighted the importance of international data sharing, which has led to the recent discovery that medical-grade liquid fentanyl is being released into the market by drug cartels.One official said that the newer, equally addictive but less lethal version of the drug, “is being introduced into the illicit market in the hopes of trying to hook additional people.”
Officials say Canada, Mexico, and the United States have committed to “develop and implement a common drug synthesis analysis protocol, which will allow toxicologists from all three countries to improve our understanding of regional drug trends.”
The nations also committed to increasing cooperation on a range of interlocking issues including illicit drug production, hemispheric migration, firearms trafficking, and increased joint investigations.
Notably, agents from both Canada and Mexico will be sent to the United States to help U.S. border operations better track and understand criminal trends.
“Both Mexico and Canada committed to embed personnel at the U.S. Customs and Border Protection National Targeting Center to increase and expedite information sharing on criminals and illicit activities associated with the trafficking of both fentanyl and firearms,” one official said.
The relationship between Mexico and the United States has grown tense in recent years over myriad issues related to migration, crime, and politics.
U.S. leadership is particularly concerned about drugs flowing through Mexico from South America, while Mexico is busy battling the illegal flow of firearms coming from the United States.
The decline of democratic norms in Mexico, as well as unverified allegations of connections between the drug trade and members of Mr. López Obrador’s Cabinet, have also added moments of tension to the bilateral relationship.
“How are we going to sit down at a table and talk about fighting drugs if one of their agencies is leaking information and damaging me?” Mr. López Obrador said.
“How are we going to talk about migration, how are we going to talk about fighting drugs or fentanyl?”
He also has complained about the actions of U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) agents in Mexico and worked to limit their visas following the 2020 arrest of a former Mexican defense secretary by the DEA. The United States ultimately dropped the charges and released the former official back to Mexico.
The Biden administration relies heavily on Mr. López Obrador’s Cabinet to turn away migrants in Mexico who are headed for the U.S. border.
If Mexico were to stop such efforts, the flow of drugs and illegal immigration into the United States could dramatically increase.
The Biden administration officials said that the issue of democracy in Mexico “wasn’t the subject of the meeting” and “was never raised.”
They also underscored that the two nations maintained a “very strong foundation of cooperation” and were engaged in “consistent, constructive and candid dialogue.”
“We know that our Mexican colleagues work very hard against this threat on a daily basis, that they make great sacrifices in this fight, you know, the loss of their soldiers and policemen in this fight,“ one official said. ”We recognize that and appreciate that.”
