Former Mexican President Felipe Calderon is warning the United States not to “take Mexico for granted,” and is urging his government to use every “instrument” it has to gain an upper hand in possible negotiations.
“The United States should not take for granted my country in terms of, for instance, sharing intelligence,” he told CNN’s Christiane Amanpour. “That is one instrument.”
“Second, narco-traffic and organized crime, for instance,” he added.
If the United States doesn’t want a “cooperative relationship between both countries,” he said, “we are not obligated to cooperate with the United States in any of those issues. And the same with immigration itself.”
The problem today, he said, lies not with Mexican migrants but with Central American workers who use Mexico as a transit country.
If “we don’t see a more cooperative attitude coming from the American government, we don’t need to cooperate.”
“And yes, we can lose a lot, but the Americans can lose a lot. And they need to understand: Don’t take Mexico for granted.”