[Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents Volume 33, Number 11 (Monday, March 17, 1997)]
[Page 361]
[Online from the Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]

<R04>
Statement on House of Representatives Action on Narcotics Certification 
for Mexico

March 13, 1997

    Today's vote by the House of Representatives on Mexico is the wrong 
way to continue and deepen the unprecedented cooperation we are getting 
from Mexico in the war on drugs and the wrong way to protect the 
interests of the American people.
    We all seek the same goal: to keep drugs out of America's 
neighborhoods and away from our children. Accomplishing that goal 
requires that we work closely with nations that share our objective of 
halting the flow of illegal narcotics, especially with the one country 
in the hemisphere whose 2,000 mile border with the United States makes 
it a ready target of the traffickers seeking to smuggle their contraband 
into the United States.
    I certified Mexico because in the last year, we have achieved an 
unprecedented level of cooperation on counternarcotics, because Mexico 
has taken concrete steps on its own to fight drug trafficking, and 
because certification is the best way to make sure that Mexico's 
cooperation and antidrug efforts grow even stronger.
    Under President Zedillo's leadership, Mexico broke new ground by 
extraditing two of its citizens to the United States and expelling drug 
kingpin Juan Garcia Abrego, who is now behind bars in an American prison 
for life. Our military cooperation has improved dramatically as we have 
expanded antidrug training and assistance on drug interdiction.
    Moreover, Mexico has taken the initiative by itself: Drug seizures, 
arrests, crop eradication, and the destruction of drug labs and runaways 
in Mexico have all increased. New laws to combat organized crime and 
money laundering have been enacted. And the Zedillo administration 
immediately arrested and prosecuted its drug czar when they discovered 
he had been corrupted by a major drug ring.
    President Zedillo recognizes the enormity of the problem Mexico 
faces, and he has been courageous in carrying this battle forward. He 
deserves our support, not a vote of ``no confidence'' that will only 
make it more difficult for him to work with us and defeat the scourge of 
drugs.
    I will continue to work with Congress to ensure that legislation 
that would undermine progress we have made with Mexico does not become 
law.