By Laura Gottesdiener and Aida Pelaez-Fernandez
MEXICO CITY, April 23 (Reuters) - Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum sought to de-escalate tensions with the U.S. on Thursday after the deaths of two Americans,
who sources say were CIA officers working on an anti-narcotics operation, in a car crash in the northern state of Chihuahua.
The U.S. has acknowledged that two members of its embassy in Mexico City were killed in Mexico on Sunday, without disclosing what government agency employed them. The CIA declined to comment on the matter.
Sheinbaum reiterated her condolences in her daily press conference, following criticism on Wednesday from White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt, who said that "sympathy (for the dead U.S. officials) ... would be well worth it" after being asked about Mexico's demands for more information on what exactly the Americans were doing.
"The first thing I said here in the press conference (earlier this week), and I also expressed it personally to the U.S. ambassador, were my condolences," Sheinbaum said. "The human aspect is above everything."
The deaths of the two Americans rekindled U.S.-Mexico tensions over security cooperation. The presence of U.S. personnel in anti-cartel operations is a deeply sensitive matter in Mexico. Sheinbaum has long maintained that she welcomes intelligence sharing and security cooperation but will not accept U.S. agents or forces participating in operations on Mexican territory.
In contrast, U.S. President Donald Trump has repeatedly called for greater use of U.S. military force to combat Mexican cartels, and has threatened that the U.S. could go it alone if Washington feels Mexico isn't doing enough.
The details of the incident on Sunday continue to be disputed.
Chihuahua's Attorney General Cesar Jauregui said the U.S. officials were riding with state-level Mexican officials when their vehicle crashed early in the morning, killing four people. The vehicle was traveling in a convoy with other state investigators and Mexican Army soldiers returning from an operation to destroy clandestine drug laboratories, Jauregui said.
Jauregui later clarified that the U.S. officials did not take part in the raid, but rather were giving a training class on drones in a separate location and were given a ride by the convoy returning from the operation.
That version has come under scrutiny.
Two former U.S. officials familiar with the matter told Reuters on condition of anonymity that the Americans who died in the accident worked for the CIA. The identities of the dead U.S. officials were first reported by Mexican journalist Luis Chaparro.
The Los Angeles Times reported, based on anonymous sources, that there were a total of four CIA officers present at the raid. The officers were wearing uniforms of the Chihuahua state investigation agency, the newspaper reported. Reuters was not able to verify those details.
DIPLOMATIC SPAT COULD BACKFIRE ON MEXICAN PRESIDENT
On Monday, Sheinbaum said she was not aware of any U.S. officials working with Chihuahua on anti-narcotics work and said her government would investigate whether Mexico's national security law had been broken.
Mexico's government later sent a diplomatic note to the U.S. embassy requesting an explanation over the presence of the U.S. officials in Chihuahua.
Security expert Vanda Felbab-Brown said the diplomatic spat with Washington might backfire on Mexico's president.
"There's still a lot of people in the administration in Washington pushing for unilateral military action against the cartels in Mexico and this could play into their hands," she said.
"This could support their argument that trying to work with Mexico is a failed policy and the U.S. needs to go it alone."
The incident also has caused tensions inside Mexico between the president, who represents the ruling Morena party, and the state of Chihuahua, which is run by the opposition National Action Party. The senate has summoned Chihuahua Governor Maria Campos to discuss the incident.
The CIA has a long history of working in Mexico, particularly on anti-narcotics issues. Last year, Reuters revealed the agency runs covert operations in Mexico, training and equipping elite Mexican units to capture some of the country's most wanted drug lords.
(Reporting by Laura Gottesdiener in Monterrey, Aida Pelaez-Fernandez in Mexico City; additional reporting by Jonathan Landay in Washingon; editing by Stephen Eisenhammer and Paul Simao)
