Governor meets with Mexican president amid border tension

Gov. Janet Napolitano began two days of meetings with Mexican President Felipe Calder—n on Thursday to discuss border security and economic issues.

The Democrat’s mission took on added urgency after an incident northwest of Tucson.

Three illegal immigrants, believed to have crossed the Mexican border into Arizona, were killed and two injured after gunmen with assault rifles met them at a known smuggling point.

One man was found dead on a dirt road near the Silverbell Mine 20 miles northwest of Tucson. Authorities later found two more men dead a few miles north in the cab of a pickup truck that had been carrying the migrants.

Napolitano and a delegation of Arizona government, business and education leaders planned the trip to Mexico before the incident in Tucson and “have a pretty packed schedule” for this two-day summit with our neighbor nation. Border security and safety are at the top of the agenda.

The Arizona-Mexico Commission, a nonprofit organization out of the governor’s office, helped arrange the group of professionals that will accompany Napolitano down south.

The mission statement for the commission, founded in 1959, said, “To improve the economic well-being and quality of life for residents of Arizona by promoting a strong, cooperative relationship with Mexico and Latin America through advocacy, trade, networking and information.”

“We really want to establish a face-to-face, government-to-government relationship now that we’ve had a change in leadership,” Napolitano said in an interview with the Green Valley News.

“We’ll meet with all heads of state to begin to open up a working dialogue.”

Thursday marked the first meeting between the leaders. Calder—n took over for Vicente Fox in December. Fox had been at the helm since 2000.

“I had a good relationship with President Fox, but the problem is both he and President Bush disengaged from the immigration problem. Now, we are finally getting back on track,” Napolitano said.

As for Napolitano’s expectations for her working relationship with Calder—n?

“It’s too soon to tell,” she said.

Many tangible solutions have been proposed to make both sides happy in the immigration argument.

“I was the first governor to call for troops on the border and I think we’re getting better control,” Napolitano said.

Operation Jump Start placed thousands of National Guardsmen along our southern border.

“I am really happy with this program. The proof is in the pudding. Illegal apprehensions are way up and border crossing significantly down,” said the governor.

In fact, according to the Department of Homeland Security’s Web site, border apprehensions were down 8.4 percent compared with fiscal year 2005. Which means that the National Guard on the border game plan might have worked as a deterrent to those seeking to cross.

amackey@gvnews.com|547-9726