Latin America and the United States The distance of neighbours
Disagreements over the Iraqi war inject a new bitterness
BRUTALIST and squat, the American embassy in Mexico City has
always had a forbidding air. As the fighting in Iraq raged, the
ring of steel fences protecting it were pushed so far forward
that they encroached on Avenida Reforma, one of the capital's
main streets. That physical gap symbolises the political and
emotional gulf that has opened up between Mexico and its main
trading partner. Each day protests, and sometimes near-riots,
took place outside the embassy, fuelled by a diet of gory, anti-
American coverage of the Iraqi war in the Mexican media. Most
Mexicans have been thoroughly opposed to the war. That is why
President Vicente Fox volunteered the information that he would
not have backed a second resolution on Iraq last month had the
issue come to a vote in the Security Council, of which Mexico is
a temporary member. Chile's government, which holds Latin
America's other Security Council