The Week in Mexico

2:00 a.m. July 19, 2009 (San Diego-Union Tribune)

Visa dispute with Canada: Mexico retaliated against Canada for imposing new visa requirements on Mexicans, saying Canadian officials and diplomats would now need visas to enter Mexico. Mexican Foreign Minister Patricia Espinosa announced the move at the U.S. State Department in Washington, where she met Thursday with Canadian Foreign Minister Lawrence Cannon and Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton. She said Mexico would not force Canadian tourists to get visas. Canada began requiring visas from travelers from Mexico and the Czech Republic last week after determining the number of false refugee claims from those two countries was inordinately high.

Elections conference: University of San Diego scholar Emily Edmonds-Poli said July 5 election results show President Felipe Calderón's National Action Party, or PAN, will likely face major difficulties in 2012 elections. The former ruling Institutional Revolutionary Party, or PRI, won five of six governorships and 37 percent of the vote for congressional seats, while the PAN won one governorship and 28 percent of the congressional vote. Edmonds-Poli said at USD's Trans-Border Institute that Enrique Peña Nieto, the PRI governor of the state of Mexico, leads polls for the 2012 presidential race with 36 percent of voter preferences. Former presidential candidate Andrés Manuel López Obrador or Mexico City Mayor Marcelo Ebrard, both of the leftist Democratic Revolution Party, had around 30 percent. Polls give former PAN Interior Minister Santiago Creel single-digit support.