Trump, Obrador agree to take action to stem flow of weapons to Mexico

Mexico’s foreign minister said on Saturday that President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador and his US counterpart Donald Trump had agreed to take swift action to stem the flow of illegal weapons from the United States into Mexico, where a drug war is raging.

Lopez Obrador told Trump on a phone call that he proposed “both countries use technology to close the border, to freeze the traffic of arms that is killing people in Mexico,” Foreign Minister Marcelo Ebrard told reporters.

“And Trump responded that he thought it was a good idea that this could be done using technology,” Ebrard said, adding that the idea is to install at all border crossings advanced lasers, X-rays and metal detectors, capable of even detecting chemical products.

Not only could that staunch the flow of illegal weapons into Mexico, but also the trafficked drugs into the United States, said Ebrard.

Increasing the number of Mexican intelligence agents in the United States is another proposal that is on the table.

Lopez Obrador told Trump “he was very concerned” that gang members used .50 caliber, armor-piercing rifles during the breakout of violence in the northwestern city of Culiacan over the attempted arrest of Ovidio Guzman, a son of jailed drug lord Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman.