Off the wire
• Spotlight: First human-pig chimera embryos created for organ transplant  • Burundi regrets human rights report by European parliament  • Spanish stock market falls 0.38 pct, closes at 9,512 points  • UN chief sends Lunar New Year greetings to Chinese people  • Alipay takes off with Finnair  • Empire State Building shines in special Chinese Lunar New Year design  • Kenyan gov't in talks to end university lecturer strike  • Road license proposal ignites debate over commercialization of public services in Finland  • Kenya's bourse key indices dip as foreign investors cede to locals  • African regional bloc IGAD condemns Al-Shabaab attack in Somalia  
You are here: 　 Home

2nd LD Writethru: Mexican president cancels meeting with Trump amid wall dispute

Xinhua, January 27, 2017 Adjust font size:

Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto said on Thursday he will not attend a work meeting with U.S. President Donald Trump scheduled for Tuesday in Washington.

"This morning we informed the White House that I will not attend the work meeting planned for next Tuesday with the POTUS," Pena Nieto said on Twitter.

His comments came hours after Trump, who took office last week, tweeted that the meeting should be canceled if Mexico is unwilling to pay for a border wall.

"If Mexico is unwilling to pay for the badly needed wall, then it would be better to cancel the upcoming meeting," Trump said in a pair of tweets.

The talks were originally planned on issues about renegotiation of North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and migrants.

The row over the wall between Mexico and the United States escalated on Wednesday when Trump signed an executive order on the "immediate construction of a physical wall on the southern border."

Trump has maintained that Mexico would ultimately bear the cost of building the wall.

Pena Nieto responded later on Wednesday that his country rejected the U.S. decision to build a border wall and "will not pay for any wall."

Building a wall between the United States and Mexico was a central and controversial part of Trump's campaign, which drew support from low-income voters who believed that their jobs have been taken away by Mexicans as well as ire from opponents who considered the wall to be a symbol of xenophobia. Endit