ZEDILLO PUSHES U.S. ON DRUGS

Mexican President Ernesto Zedillo said yesterday the United States was not
an innocent bystander in the drug war, and cartels could only be toppled by
reducing rampant U.S. consumption. In New York on a two-day U.S. visit,
Zedillo said drug trafficking was Mexico's biggest national security
problem.

"But we can only solve it if we continue to work together - it is a shared
responsibility," he said.

Mexico, often prickly when it believes the U.S. is meddling in its affairs,
is one of the main routes for cocaine traffic from South America. Last week,
the U.S. released a blacklist of 12 suspected international drug kingpins -
six of whom were Mexicans.