Remarks to the United States-Mexico Binational Commission and an exchange with reporters - President Bill Clinton - Transcript

Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents, June 28, 1993

The President. Please sit down, ladies and gentlemen. I want to welcome all of you here to the Roosevelt Room at the White House and say a special word of welcome to our distinguished guests from Mexico.

Today the U.S.-Mexico Binational Commission is holding its 10th meeting at the State Department. I want to say how very proud I am as President to welcome all the participants here. There is no closer partnership between two nations than that which have with our neighbor Mexico. We share strong ties of history. Our cultures are richly interwoven. Our people are strong in their bonds of kinship and friendship. And the peaceful cooperation of the communities along our 2,000-mile border is not only important but is a real tribute to both our peoples.

An important sign of this close relationship is the Binational Commission itself, which provides a forum for our Cabinets to meet annually to work on issues ranging from the environment to education to telecommunications. Another sign of that partnership is our increasingly close cooperation in world affairs and our commitment to support democracy here in this hemisphere. We worked together to help end the war in El Salvador. Mexico has contributed to the International Civilian Mission of Human Rights Observers in Haiti. Mexico's leadership in the OAS was critical to the successful collective defense of democracy in Guatemala. And President Salinas speaks with a special authority as one of the world's leading economic reformers when he calls for progress in the Uruguay round to expand world trade.

Mexico and the United States agree that the movement toward open markets and free trade in Latin America is vital for the long term success and strengthening of democracy and human rights in this hemisphere. The countries of Latin American have already made tremendous strides. The emergence of democratically elected governments in this region has permitted Latin America to modernize and to develop. The Latin countries have made enormous progress restructuring and opening their economics, controlling inflation, and increasing the competitiveness of their own productive sectors. In the last 2 years, for the first time in a decade, Latin America has had real growth in per capita income.

Democratic governments have achieved peace, strengthened freedoms, and accelerated the pace of economic integration. With the support of the OAS and the United Nations, internal conflicts in Nicaragua and El Salvador have ended and hopefully will soon end in Guatemala. The OAS routinely observes the freedom of elections across the region. Subregional free trade agreements have emerged throughout the hemisphere. These are points that were recently very well articulated by Foreign Minister Solana at the OAS and those which we in the United States enthusiastically embrace.

Increasingly today, the line has blurred between domestic and foreign policies. What we do abroad directly affects us here at home. And our success at home directly impacts what we are able to do abroad. No relationship illustrates better the strong linkage between foreign and domestic policies than the relationship between the United States and Mexico. The interdependence of our societies and our people are stronger than ever, and they will continue to grow. Domestic policies affect the lives and prosperity of Mexicans, even if they are American domestic policies, in the same way that the domestic policies of Mexico profoundly affect us.

You need only look at the scope and complexity of today's agenda in this meeting to understand how important Mexico and the United States are to each other. We will work to deepen and expand that partnership. One of the most productive areas in which we must work is on trade between our two nations. That has doubled in the last 5 years. This trade is vital to our economic future, to Mexico's economic future, and to our cooperation in every other area of endeavor. It is making both of our economies grow. It is making both of us more efficient and more competitive in global markets. And it adds to the resources we can use to address our common concerns such as the environment.

That is why I am firmly committed to the North American Free Trade Agreement and why the American people and Congress will, I hope and believe, support the NAFTA this year. We are the world's number one exporter. Exports are creating more jobs for us in the last few years than any other source of economic activity. American workers and companies want to be able to compete fully and fairly in global markets. They seek no special advantage, only a level playing field. Mexico has already made important stride in labor rights and in protecting the environment. And when we conclude the side agreements which are now the subject of negotiations, we will have an even broader basis for cooperation and progress and a warmer embrace of the NAFTA here in the Unite States.

By approving NAFTA, we can cement in place a new source of jobs and economic growth for workers in Canada, Mexico, an our own country. And we'll do more than that. We can send a signal to the nations o the Americas that are on their way to rebuilding their economies, that we are on our way to work them to build a hemisphere of freer trade, more jobs, and higher growth.