FILE PHOTO: Mexico’s President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador attends a news conference at the National Palace in Mexico City, Mexico August 30, 2019. REUTERS/Henry Romero
October 19, 2019
MEXICO CITY (Reuters) – Mexico’s president, Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, said on Saturday his U.S. counterpart Donald Trump called him to express his “solidarity” following an attempt to arrest a drug kingpin’s son that prompted a wave of violence in the northwestern city of Culiacan.
Cartel gunmen surrounded about 35 police and national guards on Thursday in the capital of Sinaloa state and made them free Ovidio Guzman, one of jailed drug lord Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman’s dozen or so children, after his brief detention set off widespread gun battles and a jailbreak that stunned the country.
“I received a call from President Trump expressing his solidarity following the events in Culiacan. I thank you for respecting our sovereignty and your willingness to maintain a policy of being good neighbors, based on cooperation for the development and welfare of our peoples,” Lopez Obrador said on Twitter.
(Reporting by Anthony Esposito in Mexico City; Editing by Matthew Lewis)
