MEXICO CITY, Dec 17 ― The US and Mexican governments yesterday sought to defuse a controversy over Washington's plan to monitor Mexican labour standards under a new regional trade deal, with Mexico saying it was satisfied by US assurances it was not sending inspectors.

Mexico, the United States and Canada last Tuesday agreed to revised terms for the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA), to replace the 1994 North American Free Trade Agreement (Nafta).

That same day, the US Congress set out how Washington planned to send attaches south to monitor application of Mexican labour laws, which Democratic lawmakers worry are too lax. Over the weekend, the Mexican government objected to the plan.

US Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer met with Mexican deputy foreign minister Jesus Seade in Washington yesterday and said in a letter that use of attaches was a common practice, and that Mexican legislation would be upheld.

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“These personnel will not be 'labour inspectors' and will abide by all relevant Mexican laws,” Lighthizer said in the letter. Asked whether the letter satisfied Mexico's concerns, Seade told reporters in Washington: “Absolutely.”

“Ambassador Lighthizer was completely in the right... in saying sorry,” Seade said, adding that Mexican officials had not identified anything else “questionable” in the US plan.

Shortly afterward, foreign ministry spokesman Roberto Velasco said in Mexico City his government had received confirmation there would be no US labour inspectors.

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At an earlier news conference, Mexican Foreign Minister Marcelo Ebrard said the spat would not put the USMCA at risk, and that it would be up to Mexico whether to give accreditation to proposed labour attaches on its territory.

“The attaches are authorised by Mexico,” he told reporters. “No country can assign attaches in Mexico but us.”

Critics of Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador see the labour provision as the latest in a string of concessions granted to US President Donald Trump following agreements on migration and security.

A bill for implementing USMCA presented in the US House of Representatives on Friday would designate up to five US experts to monitor compliance with Mexican labour reform.

A House committee expects to vote on the legislation today, with a vote by the full House expected later in the week, according to congressional sources.

At the weekend, Seade, the Mexican official in charge of USMCA negotiations, criticised the US plan to send labour experts to Mexico, saying it was not part of the accord signed by the three countries.

In his letter, Lighthizer said any “good faith questions about whether workers at a particular facility are being denied labour rights” would be investigated by an independent, three-person panel chosen by both parties, not the labour attaches.

The row is the latest outbreak of tensions over trade in North America triggered by Trump's decision to renegotiate Nafta after he took office in 2017.

Concerns about trade have cast a shadow over Mexico's economy, which sends about 80 per cent of its exports to the United States.

Trump has worked to push Lopez Obrador into tightening Mexico's borders and accepting migrants seeking asylum in the United States while their cases are heard in US courts.

Mexico's peso yesterday strengthened to less than 19 per dollar, its strongest in more than five months. ― Reuters