Mexican president picks veteran diplomat to be next foreign minister

MEXICO CITY (AP) — Mexico’s president has named the country’s current ambassador to Chile as the next foreign relations secretary to replace Marcelo Ebrard, who resigned to pursue the presidential nomination. President Andrés Manuel López Obrador noted the solid background of the Harvard-educated Alicia Bárcena, who served for nearly 14 years as executive secretary of the United Nations’ Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean, and has been Mexico’s ambassador to Chile since September. Ebrard is mainly known for leading Mexico’s effort to bring gun-trafficking lawsuits against U.S. arms manufacturers and gun stores.