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 News Around the Republic of Mexico | January 2008 
US Official Says Drug Aid Package to Mexico Won't be Tied to Extraditions
 Associated Press
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Mexico City – A $1.4 billion anti-drug aid package will not be contingent on Mexico's performance in extraditing suspects, but will likely increase cooperation and extraditions, a top State Department official said late this week.
David T. Johnson, who heads the department's Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs, clarified statements he made a day earlier during a visit to Mexico that indicated the aid package might be tied to the number of crime suspects sent across the border to the U.S.
“If these programs are funded and implemented, we would expect that investigations could be improved, that our joint work together would be more effective, that successful investigations would likely result in successful prosecutions, and some of those prosecutions would likely take place in the United States, and therefore extraditions might come as a consequence of that,” he said. “But they are not a goal of that.”
He said both Mexico and the U.S. would determine how to judge whether the aid was being used effectively.
“We want to engage and try to come to some sort of common view as to how we score ourselves,” he said.
Bush has asked Congress to approve $550 million of the package, but lawmakers have not yet taken action. The money would be used to help Mexico in its nationwide battle against drug trafficking and increasing violence.
Extradition has historically been a sensitive question in Mexico. For decades, the country sent few people home to face justice, and has only recently begun to extradite those who face life imprisonment. Mexico still refuses to extradite anyone who could receive the death penalty. |
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