Mexico – US Ambassador Summoned Over Trump ‘Caravan’ Remarks

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In a clearly politicized move, the Mexican secretary of the interior, Mr Alfonso Navarrete Prida, stated that he had called upon the US ambassador in Mexico, Ms Roberta Jacobson, to offer explanations to US President Trump’s remarks earlier in the week about the threat of violence among immigrants who travel in large groups to the Mexican-US border.

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Mr Trump, when discussing the immigrant ‘caravan’ heading to the US border, had declared that: "Remember my opening remarks at Trump Tower when I opened? Everybody said, 'Oh, he was so tough,' and I used the word rape."

"And yesterday it came out where this journey coming up, women are raped at levels that nobody has ever seen before. They don't want to mention that."

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White House press secretary Ms Sarah Huckabee Sanders was also questioned about the remarks yesterday and responded that she was "not sure why the media is acting like this isn't a well-established fact, women and young girls are brutally victimized on the journey north."

However, Secretary Mr Navarrete Prida was quick to dismiss Ms Sanders’ statement, saying that "the Foreign Relations department called in the ambassador yesterday, which is diplomatic mechanism we have, to cite concrete cases where there supposedly had been rapes of Hondurans, given that is part of an aggressive rhetoric, and express very clearly the rejection of that."

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">The Caravan is largely broken up thanks to the strong immigration laws of Mexico and their willingness to use them so as not to cause a giant scene at our Border. Because of the Trump Administrations actions, Border crossings are at a still UNACCEPTABLE 46 year low. Stop drugs!</p>&mdash; Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) <a href="https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/981859214380462081?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">April 5, 2018</a></blockquote>

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Of course, the decision of US President Trump to send the national guard to the US-Mexican border and the earlier decision of the Mexican government to grant humanitarian visas to most of the ‘caravan’ group comes in the midst of a Mexican Presidential election campaign where the governing party is trailing the leading candidate by 20 points according to the latest polls.

They will, therefore, do all they can to appear very strong and willing to stand up against Mr Trump.

Source:

http://www.milenio.com/politica/secretario_gobernacion-navarrete_prida-pena_nieto-milenio_noticias-laguna_0_1152484929.html