Criticisms of Mexico on TV’s ‘Drug Wars’ Unfair, Embassy Says

Some statements critical of Mexico voiced in NBC News interviews done for the television miniseries “Drug Wars” were unfair and possibly made in bad faith, the Mexican government contended today.

The program, a dramatization based on the 1985 killing of U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration agent Enrique Camarena, was broadcast Sunday through Tuesday nights.

Each episode in the miniseries, produced by the network’s entertainment division, was followed by a 15-minute interview segment produced by NBC News.

The Mexican government, in a statement distributed at a news conference at its embassy here, said “some assertions made by the interviewer, reporter and guests are the product of sheer ignorance, imprecise, unfair, lacking of any evidence, and, maybe, in bad faith.”

Lloyd Siegel, executive producer for special broadcasts at NBC News, said the network took pains to see that Mexico’s point of view was represented and “we do not accept the charge that there were any inaccuracies or inconsistencies” in its reporting.

Javier Treveino, a spokesman for the embassy, said Mexico was invited to have a representative interviewed on the program but declined.

Gustavo Gonzalez, legal adviser to the embassy, said Mexican officials were apprehensive that any statements they made could be used by attorneys representing the men charged with Camarena’s murder.

The statement distributed at the news conference said the killings were “an aggressive act by organized crime, and by no means imputable to the Mexican government.”

The statement said an assertion was made on the program that “Mexico is just like Panama, and that drug corruption is deep and pervasive, and that almost in every part of the country there is a local Noriega, a comandante, a general, a governor getting rich by dealing with Colombian cartel drug bosses.”

The statement said this assertion “is not only irresponsible and malign, but it also deeply hurts the Mexican people and institutions that are courageously fighting drugs every day.”