Mexico City (EFE).- The Mexican president, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, asked this Wednesday the country’s criminal groups to take the initiative and abandon illegal activities, as have been requested by the associations of mothers who search for the disappeared who are looking for a peace pact.
“That they take the initiative and that they abandon the illegal activity and that they do not continue damaging, but we do not have contemplated reaching an agreement (with organized crime),” said the ruler during his daily press conference.
The president thus referred to the recent statements by Ceci Flores, leader of the Madres Buscadoras de Sonora collective, who assured that the Mexican cartels are already accepting a peace pact that these organizations proposed to them.
“We want to share that the cartels are already accepting this peace pact,” said the activist, one of the best-known social leaders in Mexico, in a video.
“Think about joining the other cartels, I think nobody likes to be in danger, as those who joined the call have already said: we are all fathers, mothers, friends and a lot of blood has already been spilled in our Mexico,” he added.
Support for peace without impunity
In this regard, López Obrador promised support for everything that means calling for peace, celebrated the call made by the mothers of the disappeared in Mexico and asked that the criminals listen to the petition.
However, he warned that there will be no impunity for those who commit crimes in the country.
“We cannot guarantee that action will not be taken against those who violate the law, we cannot do that, there can be no impunity,” he clarified.
He added that the cartels should consider that violence is not the path they should follow, that no one can be harmed, nor can they use young people to commit crimes.
He reiterated that evil must be faced with good and that it is circumstances that make people take a bad path.
López Obrador’s resistance to corridos lying down
The president insisted that he has a musical selection so that young people get away from certain musical genres and ways of life.
“You can be happy without listening to those things (corridos lying down),” he remarked.
In addition, he pointed out that his government cannot accept the “law of retaliation” and rejected the use of force. “We believe in retraining,” he noted.
For this reason, he defended his strategy of “hugs, not bullets” against crime.
The Mexican government has reported that 12,582 homicides have occurred so far in 2023, an average of 83 per day, with May as the most violent month so far this year in Mexico with 2,660 intentional homicides.
Homicides had an annual drop of 7.1% in 2022, when Mexico had 30,968 murders after the two most violent years in its history, under the mandate of López Obrador, with 34,690 murder victims in 2019 and 34,554 in 2020, followed by 33,308 in 2021.