EL PASO, Texas (Border Report) – Mexico’s public safety secretary has confirmed that U.S. government drones flew missions this week near the Mexican capital.
Omar Garcia Harfuch said the American unmanned aerial vehicles’ presence was requested by Mexico.
“They are drones or UAVs that fly at the specific request of Mexican government institutions … In support of investigations we are conducting in our country,” Garcia said at a news conference of the Public Safety Cabinet in Mexico City. “No aircraft, no military airplane flies in our country like that (without consent).”
The drone flight or flights over a region called Valle de Mexico, some 40 miles west of Mexico City, came a day after the Mexican government sent a new batch of imprisoned drug traffickers and human smugglers to the United States. Last February, Mexico turned over to the U.S. 29 fugitives, including former drug lords Rafael Caro Quintero, Vicente Carrillo Fuentes and Miguel Angel Trevino Morales.
The 26 turned over this week included high-ranking members of the Sinaloa cartel, the Jalisco New Generation Cartel (CJNG) and the Zetas. Among them was Abigael Gonzalez Valencia, the leader of the Cuinis gang associated with CJNG’s cocaine trafficking operations in South America.
Garcia Harfuch publicly defended the expulsions of its citizens even though several had secured court orders in Mexico to prevent their extradition to the U.S. The prisoners were running criminal enterprises from behind bars; some may have been planning to escape, he said.
“These high-profile criminals, that even incarcerated continued to direct illicit activities though (third parties), represented an unacceptable risk for public safety,” Garcia Harfuch said. “This action was taken to prevent that from their prison they continued organizing kidnappings, extortion, murders and other crimes. It was an act of authority based on a policy of zero impunity.”
The secretary said the extraditions, like the U.S. drone flights, are mutually beneficial for both governments and seemed to emphasize they were not a mandate from abroad.
“These are actions to safeguard public safety, reduce violence and protect citizens with full respect to our sovereignty and in reciprocity with the United States,” he said at the conference. “This decision is taken for the sake of national interest. This was a sovereign decision … in alignment with our national strategy to protect our citizens.”