MEXICO CITY - "Mexico is respected, we are not a colony or protectorate of any country," Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum said Monday.

While presiding over Flag Day celebrations at Campo Marte, a military equestrian field, the president highlighted a constitutional reform initiative to protect the country from foreign interference, affirming "it is no longer like before when governments knelt before foreign governments or looked abroad for examples to follow."

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The proposed reform aims "to remind the entire world that Mexico is a free, independent and sovereign country and that its people do not allow the violation of its sovereignty," she said.

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"The initiative establishes that the people of Mexico will under no circumstances accept intervention, interference, or any other act from abroad that is harmful to the integrity, independence and sovereignty of the nation," she stressed.

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As commander of the Mexican Armed Forces, she paid tribute to the flag, calling it "a symbol of migrants, a symbol of our people in their tireless struggle for justice, and a symbol, above all, of our independence."

The proposed reform responds to the recent US designation of Mexican drug cartels as terrorist organizations, as well as the controversial arrest of drug trafficker Ismael 'El Mayo' Zambada in July, which was carried out by US authorities without involving Mexican officials.