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Chertoff: Mexico Troop Reports Overblown
By ELLIOT SPAGAT
Associated Press Writer
SAN DIEGO (AP) -- Reports of Mexican soldiers frequently crossing onto U.S. soil are overblown, and many of the incidents are just mistakes, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said.
Chertoff's remarks followed a newspaper report that Mexican military units had crossed into the United States 216 times since 1996. The report by the Inland Valley Daily Bulletin of Ontario on Sunday was based on a Homeland Security Department report.
Chertoff estimated there were only about 20 crossings a year, and said "a significant number of those are innocent things" in which police or military from Mexico step across the border because they're not aware of exactly where the line is.
"I think to create the image that somehow there is a deliberate effort by the Mexican military to cross the border would be to traffic in scare tactics," he said Wednesday.
Rafael Laveaga, a spokesman for the Mexican Embassy in Washington, declined to comment. He stood by earlier remarks that the Mexican military has never deliberately stepped onto U.S. soil. He declined to say if there were any unintentional crossings.
The head of a labor union that represents about 10,500 U.S. Border Patrol agents dismissed Chertoff's remarks as a "diplomatic response" to a long-running problem on the U.S.-Mexico border.
"It really doesn't surprise me that he's playing the diplomat," said T.J. Bonner, president of the National Border Patrol Council. "This is a guy whose time on the border can be measured in hours, not years."
Bonner said Mexican soldiers - possibly some Army deserters - are providing protection for drug runners.
"It's all about the drugs," he said. "The lure of the riches of the cartel, they're too many for many of their solders to resist, whether they're corrupted on active duty or take up with other bands."
Homeland Security recorded an annual average of 21.6 Mexican military incursions since the 1996 fiscal year, according to the Inland Valley Daily Bulletin. Incidents peaked at 40 in 2002 and dropped to nine in the 2005 fiscal year that ended in September.
The Border Patrol's El Centro sector, which covers southeastern California, recorded the most incursions since 1996 (58), followed by Tucson, Ariz., (39), El Paso, Texas (33) and McAllen, Texas, (28), according to the newspaper. Del Rio, Texas, recorded only three incidents, the fewest of the agency's nine sectors along the southwest border.
Peter Nunez, the U.S. attorney in San Diego from 1982 to 1988, said it was difficult to know if the reports are overblown without additional information.
"Who's reporting these things?" he said. "What are the details?"
---
Associated Press writer Lara Jakes Jordan in Washington contributed to this report.
Chertoff: Mexico Troop Reports Overblown
By ELLIOT SPAGAT
Associated Press Writer
SAN DIEGO (AP) -- Reports of Mexican soldiers frequently crossing onto U.S. soil are overblown, and many of the incidents are just mistakes, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said.
Chertoff's remarks followed a newspaper report that Mexican military units had crossed into the United States 216 times since 1996. The report by the Inland Valley Daily Bulletin of Ontario on Sunday was based on a Homeland Security Department report.
Chertoff estimated there were only about 20 crossings a year, and said "a significant number of those are innocent things" in which police or military from Mexico step across the border because they're not aware of exactly where the line is.
"I think to create the image that somehow there is a deliberate effort by the Mexican military to cross the border would be to traffic in scare tactics," he said Wednesday.
Rafael Laveaga, a spokesman for the Mexican Embassy in Washington, declined to comment. He stood by earlier remarks that the Mexican military has never deliberately stepped onto U.S. soil. He declined to say if there were any unintentional crossings.
The head of a labor union that represents about 10,500 U.S. Border Patrol agents dismissed Chertoff's remarks as a "diplomatic response" to a long-running problem on the U.S.-Mexico border.
"It really doesn't surprise me that he's playing the diplomat," said T.J. Bonner, president of the National Border Patrol Council. "This is a guy whose time on the border can be measured in hours, not years."
Bonner said Mexican soldiers - possibly some Army deserters - are providing protection for drug runners.
"It's all about the drugs," he said. "The lure of the riches of the cartel, they're too many for many of their solders to resist, whether they're corrupted on active duty or take up with other bands."
Homeland Security recorded an annual average of 21.6 Mexican military incursions since the 1996 fiscal year, according to the Inland Valley Daily Bulletin. Incidents peaked at 40 in 2002 and dropped to nine in the 2005 fiscal year that ended in September.
The Border Patrol's El Centro sector, which covers southeastern California, recorded the most incursions since 1996 (58), followed by Tucson, Ariz., (39), El Paso, Texas (33) and McAllen, Texas, (28), according to the newspaper. Del Rio, Texas, recorded only three incidents, the fewest of the agency's nine sectors along the southwest border.
Peter Nunez, the U.S. attorney in San Diego from 1982 to 1988, said it was difficult to know if the reports are overblown without additional information.
"Who's reporting these things?" he said. "What are the details?"
---
Associated Press writer Lara Jakes Jordan in Washington contributed to this report.
