Will Joe Biden help Mexico get guns off its streets? 70% of weapons used in crimes come from America: Report
The tumultuous 2020 saw a sharp rise in gun sales across the US, thanks to social and economic factors, and now, the country is facing a challenging situation from across its southern border over the same issue. Southern neighbor Mexico has asked the Joe Biden administration in Washington to help it get guns removed off its streets.
Mexican authorities have said that guns used in committing crimes on their soil are linked to the US, according to the Border Report (BR). It cited the Mexican government as saying that about 70 percent of gun crimes there are carried out with weapons that come from the US and out of them, more 40 percent come from Texas alone. The country is taking measures to tackle the situation.
“The Mexican government is going to propose specific actions to U.S. authorities, including intrusive and non-intrusive inspections of vehicles at the border, as well as the use of technology to stop arms trafficking,” Fabian Medina Hernandez, chief of the Office of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Mexico, was quoted as saying by BR.
Medina also estimated that guns numbering between 2.5 and three million – ranging from small arms to semi-automatic weapons that are used by drug cartels – entered Mexico from the US in the past decade.
Not enough inspection at the border
That the arrangements in place now to tackle the challenge are not sufficient was evident from the BR report. It said Mexico inspects only about one in 20 vehicles that enter its territory from places like El Paso, Texas. Also, in Juarez, which has the only X-ray machine at the Bridge of the Americas port of entry, only four to five vehicles can be inspected at a time. Moreover, BR cited habitual commuters to say that southbound checking by the US Customs and Border Protection is also irregular.
Medina, who was speaking at an online arms trafficking forum on Thursday, January 28, also said: “There are 9,000 sales points for guns along the U.S. border. I don’t know that they have as many McDonald’s restaurants as they have gun stores there.”
He estimated that despite Mexico having a strict anti-gun culture where the few who legally own gun must have it registered with the defense ministry, more than 16 million guns are doing the rounds in the hands of civilians. Mexican authorities have also alleged that some of the weapons that were used to target Mexico City's police chieflast June were smuggled from the US.
The issue came to the fore in May last year when the foreign minister of Mexico posted a video online showing a diplomatic note to the American embassy there requesting for remarks about a gun-running sting under the former Barack Obama presidency. In the video, Mexican Secretary of Foreign Affairs Marcelo Ebrard cited former US attorney general Eric Holder as saying that officials in Mexico knew about the 2009-11 scheme called ‘Fast and Furious’.
“It was the first time Ebrard or President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador had made direct reference by name to a key U.S. figure connected to the program since the issue resurfaced in Mexico a week ago,” Reuters reported, adding: “In a bid to curb cross-border gun smuggling, the U.S. scheme allowed people to illegally buy arms in the United States and take them to Mexico so that the weapons could be tracked and lead law enforcement officials to crime bosses. Some of those guns were subsequently blamed for the fatal shootings of both Mexican and U.S. citizens.”
It also said the current government in Mexico has focused on the program to highlight a possible corruption under previous regimes as a debate raged on over how much they knew about the American operation.
Last month, Mexico’s Secretariat of Security and Civilian Protection released a study in which it was said that of the guns that were used for crimes in Mexico and traced back to the US, 41 percent had links to Texas, which shares a lengthy border with the southern neighbor, Daily Mail reported.
Josiah Heyman, a professor of anthropology and director of the Center for Interamerican and Border Studies at the University of Texas at El Paso, told BR that it was time for both the US and Mexico to discuss the issue of gun violence.
“Not only do we have a shared problem, but also a shared responsibility and a shared opportunity,” he said, citing that several American citizens living in Mexico have been killed in Juarez since 2008.