MARK LENNIHAN / THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Mexican President Felipe Calderón seeks "market alternative" to solve the drug problem.
.MEXICO CITY - For the second time in less than a month, Mexican President Felipe Calderón has inched toward suggesting that the United States decriminalize narcotics if that's what it takes to reduce the "astronomical profits" of the crime gangs roiling his nation.
If the United States cannot reduce demand for drugs, Calderón said in New York on Monday night, then "decision makers must look for other solutions, including market alternatives."
Calderón was asked Tuesday morning on CBS' "Early Show" if he was suggesting drugs should be legalized.
"I'm talking about market alternatives, market solutions," Calderón said. "Either we reduce consumption or we need more alternatives, more solutions."
Calderón declined to specify the alternatives, or how they might reduce the profits of narcotics traffickers. But some analysts in Mexico and the United States said it was code language to open debate about legalization without using a word that draws contentious reaction.
"It's loaded. We call it the 'L word,' said Ethan Nadelmann of the Drug Policy Alliance, a New York-based group in favor of decriminalization.
"It's essentially like uttering out loud a political heresy, and he wants to avoid that."
Calderón is under growing pressure to reduce violence by organized-crime groups in Mexico that has caused more than 40,000 deaths since he took office in late 2006. His ruling party lags in polling for 2012 presidential elections in which he himself cannot seek re-election.
Calderón first used the phrase "market alternatives" on Aug. 26, the day after gangsters firebombed a casino in Monterrey, killing 52 people.
His voice cracking on occasion, he lashed out at U.S. gun shops and their "criminal sale" of assault rifles to Mexican traffickers, and said that high U.S. demand for narcotics made Americans, too, responsible for Mexico's turmoil.
Calderón repeated those criticisms during a speech Monday night at the Council of the Americas in New York even as he lauded growing U.S.-Mexico security cooperation.
U.S. demand for drugs "is the source of the criminals' greatest power," offering "exorbitant profits" that allow them to corrupt officials and equip themselves with sophisticated arsenals, he said.
Calderón hints US should legalize drugs
Mexican President Felipe Calderón seeks "market alternative" to solve the drug problem.
.MEXICO CITY - For the second time in less than a month, Mexican President Felipe Calderón has inched toward suggesting that the United States decriminalize narcotics if that's what it takes to reduce the "astronomical profits" of the crime gangs roiling his nation.
If the United States cannot reduce demand for drugs, Calderón said in New York on Monday night, then "decision makers must look for other solutions, including market alternatives."
Calderón was asked Tuesday morning on CBS' "Early Show" if he was suggesting drugs should be legalized.
"I'm talking about market alternatives, market solutions," Calderón said. "Either we reduce consumption or we need more alternatives, more solutions."
Calderón declined to specify the alternatives, or how they might reduce the profits of narcotics traffickers. But some analysts in Mexico and the United States said it was code language to open debate about legalization without using a word that draws contentious reaction.
"It's loaded. We call it the 'L word,' said Ethan Nadelmann of the Drug Policy Alliance, a New York-based group in favor of decriminalization.
"It's essentially like uttering out loud a political heresy, and he wants to avoid that."
Calderón is under growing pressure to reduce violence by organized-crime groups in Mexico that has caused more than 40,000 deaths since he took office in late 2006. His ruling party lags in polling for 2012 presidential elections in which he himself cannot seek re-election.
Calderón first used the phrase "market alternatives" on Aug. 26, the day after gangsters firebombed a casino in Monterrey, killing 52 people.
His voice cracking on occasion, he lashed out at U.S. gun shops and their "criminal sale" of assault rifles to Mexican traffickers, and said that high U.S. demand for narcotics made Americans, too, responsible for Mexico's turmoil.
Calderón repeated those criticisms during a speech Monday night at the Council of the Americas in New York even as he lauded growing U.S.-Mexico security cooperation.
U.S. demand for drugs "is the source of the criminals' greatest power," offering "exorbitant profits" that allow them to corrupt officials and equip themselves with sophisticated arsenals, he said.
Calderón hints US should legalize drugs
