Obama, Calderon vow to tackle cartels together

US President Barack Obama and Mexican leader Felipe Calderon vowed to tackle Mexico's violent drug cartels together at the start of a brief but symbolic first visit by Obama south of the border.

It was Obama's first trip to Latin America since taking office in January, and the first to Mexico by a US president in 12 years.

A sea of screaming schoolchildren waving US and Mexican flags welcomed the US president at Mexico's Los Pinos presidential residence, ahead of talks with Calderon, who has gambled his presidency on the battle against traffickers.

"At a time when the Mexican government has so courageously taken on the drug cartels that have plagued both sides of the border, it is absolutely critical that the United States joins as a full partner in dealing with this issue ... also on our side of the border in dealing with the flow of guns and cash south," Obama said.

On the eve of his visit, Obama slapped sanctions on three drug cartels and named a top US official to stiffen enforcement on the southern US border.

Last month he announced extra agents for the US border, and also vowed to staunch US demand for drugs.

Calderon called for "a new era in which the fight against crime will be fully assumed as a shared responsibility."

"Mister president, let's build a new era, yes we can," said Calderon, who has deployed tens of thousands of troops across the country to take on the cartels.

Some 7,000 people have died since the start of last year in violence between Mexican cartels and security forces, which is spilling across the US border.

In the latest violence, sixteen died in a shootout between suspected drug hitmen and soldiers in Guerrero in southwest Mexico late Wednesday, state prosecutor Eduardo Murueta said Thursday.

Obama also pledged cooperation in the face of the economic crisis, and on climate change, poverty and terrorism.

He paid homage to everything that Mexicans have brought to the United States -- where some 12 million documented and undocumented Mexicans live -- and noted that in his hometown Chicago at least one third of the population can trace back some origins to Mexico.

Obama's trip follows a wave of high-level US visits south of the border, which have marked a shift in the US stance toward Mexico and its trafficking problem, since he took office in January.

Obama and top US officials have acknowledged that -- as the world's largest consumer of cocaine -- the US shares responsibility for Mexican gang activity.

The US Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms estimates that around 90 percent of weapons confiscated in Mexico come from the United States.

Obama was also expected to reassure Mexico on economic cooperation before taking the same message to regional leaders at an Americas Summit in Trinidad and Tobago, which starts on Friday.

Trade relations have been tense since Mexico last month slapped some 2.4 billion dollars in tariffs on 89 US products, after Washington cancelled a program authorizing some Mexican trucks to operate in the United States.

Mexico, Latin America's second biggest economy, depends on the United States for around 80 percent of its exports and most of its remittances.





Dancers from Ensemble of the Turkish state opera and ballet perform the play "Rose Garden" during the Skopje Dance Festival. AFP/Robert Atanasovski