Mexico’s president has stood up to US presidential hopeful Donald Trump by saying that Mexico will not pay for a wall along the US – Mexico border and criticised Trump’s “strident rhetoric”.
President Enrique Pena Nieto’s comments were among the most critical comments of Mr Trump by any foreign leader to date.
Mr Trump has been wooing potential voters with his promise of building a wall along the whole border to lock out illegal immigrants as well as drugs.
The New York billionaire has accused Mexico of sending rapists and drug runners into the US and assured the public that he will increase fees on some Mexican visas to help to help make Mexico pay for the wall.
Asked by Excelsior newspaper if there was a "scenario" under which Mexico would pay, Pena Nieto said: "There is no scenario. I have to say that I regret (the plan), and of course, I can't agree with this American politician's position."
He also said Trump has presented "very easy, simple solutions to problems that are obviously not that easy to solve."
"And there have been episodes in human history, unfortunately, where these expressions of this strident rhetoric have only led to very ominous situations in the history of humanity," the Mexican president added.
"That's how Mussolini got in, that's how Hitler got in, they took advantage of a situation, a problem perhaps, which humanity was going through at the time, after an economic crisis.
"And I think what (they) put forward ended up at what we know today from history, in global conflagration. We don't want that happening anywhere in the world," Pena Nieto said.
In spite of his comments, Pena Nieto stressed that his administration will seek to reach agreement and maintain a respectful relationship with whoever wins the U.S. presidency.
Trump at present is the front-runner in the Republican nomination process.
