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MEXICO CITY: US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton will make a one-day visit to Mexico on Monday as the country struggles with drug-related violence that has left more than 34,000 people dead in four years.
Clinton will meet Foreign Minister Patricia Espinosa in the central colonial city of Guanajuato, the Mexican foreign ministry and US State Department said.
Collaboration on tackling Mexico's violent drug gangs will be on the agenda, as will competitiveness as the closely-tied countries emerge from the financial crisis, and development along their 3,000-kilometre (2,000-mile) border.
They were also expected to discuss advancing the global climate change agenda after the Cancun Summit last December.
The visit comes as drug violence continues to plague parts of Mexico, including a string of attacks in the Pacific resort city of Acapulco and the northern business hub of Monterrey since the start of the year.
Gunmen shot dead a local police chief on Friday in the same northern state of Durango where another police chief was decapitated this week, authorities said.
Drug violence left 15,273 dead in Mexico in 2010, according to official figures, making it the deadliest year yet since President Felipe Calderon launched a military crackdown on organised crime four years ago, with tens of thousands of troops.
The growing violence, particularly near the US border, has caused growing concern among the Obama administration.
"I don't think that the issue here is whether the stability of our of our society is at risk, but certainly, you know, this is a national security threat," Clinton spokesman Philip Crowley told reporters.
"These international criminal organisations, they have assets and weapons and people that certainly can challenge any security force."
The United States -- the main market for Mexico-trafficked drugs and supplier of illegal weapons -- has offered training and equipment to Mexico's security forces under a three-year, 1.3-billion-dollar Merida Initiative to tackle organised crime, which is set to evolve this year.
"This visit is an opportunity to reinforce the close relations between the two nations and to identify common objectives and strategies to ensure greater security and well-being for the citizens of both countries," Crowley said.
On her third official visit to Mexico, Clinton will be seeking to smooth over close ties upset last September, when she said Mexican cartels were starting to look like an insurgency.
-AFP/wk
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