Mexico and the United States launched a new joint initiative to stop arms trafficking to Mexican territory, in an attempt to attack one of the main sources of violence in the country: the illegal entry of weapons from the north to the south, something that EFE was able to verify this Monday on the Ciudad Juárez border.

The plan contemplates bilateral operations and stricter controls at international crossings, such as the one recently installed on the Córdoba-Americas Bridge, one of the busiest on the binational border and that connects Ciudad Juárez with the American El Paso, where elements of the Mexican Army check vehicles for weapons and ammunition.

Mexican authorities stressed that the objective is to “safeguard national security on both sides of the border.”
The urgency of the agreement was evident after the murder of Héctor René Rocha González, lawyer and former employee of the Municipality of Juárez, which recently occurred in the San Antonio neighborhood of the border town.

The man was chased by hitmen while driving a Jeep Wrangler and died while trying to escape running away; the aggressors shot him with an AK-47 rifle, a weapon that, according to authorities, smuggled from the United States.

For research professor Ricardo Melgoza Ramos, from the Autonomous University of Ciudad Juárez, the agreement opens a window of opportunity after failed experiences in the past.

“There was already talk of an arms trafficking agreement, we will remember the failed process of ‘Fast and Furious’. However, we believe that this new attempt may be positive,” Melgoza told EFE about the weapons tracking initiative agreed between Washington and Mexico City between 2006 and 2011.

“It must be remembered that 200,000 weapons cross from the United States to Mexico: 43% from Texas, 22% from Arizona and 9% from California. Now it will be possible to use the E-Trace platform to quickly detect the origin of the weapon. If this materializes, the flow of weapons will be reduced and criminal groups will be strangled with the financial part,” he said.

Likewise, Melgoza added that the change of security policy under the government of President Claudia Sheinbaum represents a break with the motto of ‘no bullet hugs’ by former Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador (2018-2024).

“Now more is being fought, although there are still regions, such as the Chihuahua mountain range, where organized crime has control. To achieve peace, joint work and purification of police corporations are needed,” he said.

Border operations are part of a mission that arises after the visit of US Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, to Mexico City, in which he held meetings with President Sheinbaum to strengthen cooperation between both countries on security.

“We reached an agreement that the United States will reinforce the operations (…) to control the passage of weapons from the United States to Mexico, an agreement of this type had never been reached,” the president remarked after the meeting with Rubio last September.

For his part, the lawyer and former public security official Fernando Rubalcaba highlighted the positive aspects of binational cooperation.

“The benefit is more positive thanks to these agreements, because they allow a climate of collaboration and understanding of a common cause such as public security. How good that a way to avoid the introduction of weapons is being sought, given that almost all high-impact crimes are committed with firearms,” he said.

Rubalcaba stressed that tools such as the IBIS ballistic system in Mexico and Interpol’s international IBIN program can be strengthened with this type of agreement.

“It will allow us to make cross-checks of intelligence information and better track weapons. Military filters on bridges inhibit crime and generate security, although some may perceive the opposite,” he said.

Waymo’s autonomous vehicles are being investigated by the US federal authorities after receiving information that one of their cars did not respect the signage of a school bus.

The Office of Defect Investigation (OID) of the US National Highway Safety Administration. (NHTSA in English) pointed out on its website that, according to the information received, a Waymo car did not stop when it approached a school bus that was stopped with a ‘stop’ sign deployed.

Although Waymo’s autonomous vehicle (a subsidiary of Alphabet, Google’s parent company) initially stopped, it later surrounded the vehicle despite the obligation to remain stationary, when the bus passengers were getting off, the NHTSA highlighted.

Waymo’s car operated at the time completely autonomously, without any human supervisor in the vehicle, with the company’s fifth-generation Autonomous Driving System (ADS).

The NHTSA indicated that since, as of July 2025, ADS accumulated 100 million miles traveled (161 million kilometers) and due to communication with Waymo, “the probability that similar incidents have occurred previously is high.”

“The OID has opened a preliminary assessment to investigate the behavior of Waymo’s ADS system around stopped school buses, how the system is designed to comply with road safety laws applicable to school buses and its ability to comply with those rules,” the government agency added.

Waymo is valued at about 45 billion dollars after the financing round it made in October 2024, although analysts consider that its value is much higher, and media such as the financial newspaper The Wall Street Journal raise it to 150 billion dollars.

In June, Waymo and Uber launched a totally autonomous ‘robotaxis’ commercial service in Atlanta, which allows you to circulate in an area of 170 square kilometers of the city.

In total, Waymo has a fleet of about 1,500 ‘robotaxis’ that operate in five major urban centers of the United States: Phoenix, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Atlanta and Austin. The company has plans to expand to other American cities such as Miami, Washington D.C. and Dallas, as well as internationally in the coming years.

The President of the United States, Donald Trump, urged Hamas again this Monday to stop the violence and take the terms of the peace plan it promotes with Israel in Gaza, warning that otherwise they could be “eradicated,” although in turn he ruled out the possible presence of soldiers from his country in the Strip.

“We have peace in the Middle East for the first time in history; we reached an agreement with Hamas for which they will be very good, they will behave well and they will be kind. And if not, we will go and we will eradicate them,” the president told the press during a meeting at the White House with Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese.

Trump clarified, however, that if that happened “there would be no American soldiers on the ground at all” because it would only be enough to ask several of the countries that supported the peace proposal to take charge of the Palestinian militant group: “Israel would intervene in two minutes,” he added.

“I could tell them to intervene (to the countries) and take care of it. But for now, we haven’t said it. We are going to give (Hamas) a small chance and, hopefully, there will be a little less violence,” said the president, whose plan received the support of Arab and European nations during a peace summit in Egypt.

The American insisted that the militant group “has been very violent, but no longer has the support of Iran. He no longer has the support of anyone. They have to behave well, and if they don’t, they will be eradicated,” he repeated.

Israel bombed several points in Gaza on Sunday and killed dozens of people, in response to what it interpreted as a “violation” of the agreement by Hamas, a week after the entry into force of the ceasefire promoted by the Trump Administration.

The bombings took place after clashes in the Rafah area, located in southern Gaza and controlled by the Israeli Army, which left two Israeli soldiers dead.

After these clashes, Israel claimed to have “resumed the application of the ceasefire”. Shortly after, Trump assured for his part that the truce “is still in force.”

The Republican president had already threatened last week to “kill” Hamas members if they did not comply with the ceasefire agreement with Israel and “continue to kill in Gaza.”

The militant group has mobilized in Gaza to regain control after the start of the ceasefire in the Strip, which has meant the withdrawal of Israeli troops from half of the territory. In the midst of this tense situation, there have also been clashes between Hamas and other local militias.

Several videos show summary executions of people whom Palestinian militants accuse of collaborating with Israel, which according to local sources, have occurred in Gaza City.