(Mexico) The Mexican president on Thursday demanded proof or an apology from the United States after a report which evokes an investigation by the American anti-drug agency into possible financing of his first presidential campaign in 2006 by drug traffickers.
“Let the government of the United States come forward,” Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador said during his daily press conference. “Because the president of Mexico has moral authority and political authority, and if they don’t have proof, they have to apologize.”
“How are we going to sit around the table talking about the fight against drugs if they (Editor’s note: American officials) or one of their institutions leak information that harms me, not me, but this what do I represent? “, he continued.
The online media ProPublica published on Tuesday an investigation signed by journalist Tim Golden, twice Pulitzer Prize winner “Did drug traffickers bring millions of dollars to the first campaign of Mexican President Lopez Obrador? »: this is the title of the survey.
The investigation claims that “U.S. drug enforcement agents” discovered “what they believe to be strong evidence” that “major cocaine traffickers had smuggled approximately two million” dollars to finance the first Lopez Obrador campaign in 2006.
“We are not saying that there is undeniable and irrefutable proof that these donations were made,” the journalist clarified in an interview with the Mexican media La Opinion on Wednesday, recalling that the title of the article was formulated with a point interrogation.
Lopez Obrador argued that what he considers “slander” is part of the attacks by his political opponents in the June 2 presidential election, in which his party’s candidate, Claudia Sheinbaum, is the winner.
The president, whose popularity is around 69% in the polls, accuses the American anti-narcotics agency of having failed in its anti-drug strategy.