Mexico’s president defends decision to share journalist’s phone number

MEXICO CITY: Mexico’s president on Monday shared a letter from the New York Times’ bureau chief for Mexico, Central America and the Caribbean for the second time and defended his decision last week to share herprivate telephone number publicly.

President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador shared the letter from the Times’ Natalie Kitroeff to his head of communications at his morning press conference, although the version on Monday obscured the telephone number which he had made public on Thursday. The president, however, defended the release of the number, arguing that by sending it to a government communications official Kitroeff had made it public.