The president of Mexico, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, called this Wednesday as “interfering” the call of the US Secretary of State to act with greater responsibility in the face of the murders of journalists in the country, which already add up to five so far this year.
The Mexican president thus responded to a tweet by Antony Blinken, published on Tuesday night, in which he described the high number of journalists murdered in Mexico this year as “worrying” and called on the López Obrador government to assume “greater responsibility and protections.” for Mexican journalists.
“Ask you to inform yourself and not to act in an interfering manner because Mexico is not a colony of the United States, nor is it a protectorate. Mexico is a free, independent and sovereign country,” the leftist president said in his usual morning conference.
“I think that [Blinken] he is misinformed because otherwise he would be acting in bad faith,” added the president, who also maintained that his government is dealing with crimes against communicators.
“In all cases, action is being taken, there is no impunity, they are not state crimes,” said López Obrador.
The Mexican president’s response represents a first clash with the administration of President Joe Biden, with whom he has maintained a cordial relationship until now, although with differences on specific issues.
Blinken himself visited Mexico in October of last year to launch a new stage of binational cooperation on security, called the “Bicentennial Agreement,” one of the most complex issues on the agenda between the two countries.
Blinken’s tweet, however, is not the first warning from the United States about the increase in violence against Mexican reporters.
Two weeks ago, the US embassy in Mexico declared itself “dismayed” by the situation of journalists after the murder of reporter Heber López, which occurred on February 10 in the southern state of Oaxaca, the fifth murder in less than two months.
Some 150 journalists have been killed in Mexico since 2000, according to data from the organization Reporters Without Borders (RSF).
Two of the most recent cases, that of Lourdes Maldonado, on January 23 in Tijuana, and that of López, led communicators from all over the country to protest in the streets.
More than 90% of the murders of reporters in Mexico remain unpunished, denounce organizations that defend freedom of expression.
