NUEVO LAREDO, MEXICO – Mexican President Vincente Fox met April 21 with governors from northern Mexico, promising to help them in an ongoing water dispute with the United States, Associated Press reported.
Fox met with governors from Tamaulipas, Coahuila, Nuevo Leon, Chihuahua and Hidalgo, vowing assistance on problems ranging from drug trafficking to water debt.
The United States says Mexico owes it 1.4 million acre-feet of water, under a 1944 treaty that requires Mexico to release 350,000 acre feet annually through the Rio Grande River. Mexico claims it does not have the water to repay, and hasn't released the agreed-upon levels of water into the Rio Grande since 1992, AP reported.
Mexico's water debt has created pressure on the US government by Rio Grande farmers who complain the government isn't doing enough to ensure repayment of the debt.
Some officials have urged retaliation through embargoes on Mexican crops and a holdback of the Colorado River water that the treaty requires the United States to release to Mexico.
Mexico recently agreed to release 92,000 acre-feet of water, but many officials in the Southwest have complained that much more is needed. Fox pledged to the Mexican governors that he supports their assertions that Mexico can not return all the water it owes to the United States.
In a September, 2001 meeting with US Congressional leaders, Fox said Mexico needed to improve the efficiency with which it uses water before it could realistically start to repay the debt.
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