MEXICO CITY (AP) -- Top Obama administration officials are meeting with Mexican officials to strengthen cross-border cooperation against drug cartels and criminal gangs.

The one-day visit focuses on ways to break the power of the Mexican drug trafficking organizations.

U.S. officials see a strategic problem with their neighbor's surging violence and unstable judicial and law enforcement systems.

Mexican officials blame that instability on the insatiable U.S. demand for lucrative and illegal narcotics.

The U.S. group is led by Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, who arrived from Washington with Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano, National Intelligence Director Dennis Blair and other senior officials.

They joined Defense Secretary Robert Gates and Joint Chiefs chairman Adm. Mike Mullen, who traveled separately.

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