How the arrest of cartel kingpins like Ovidio Guzman fuels Mexico’s drug violence

On the morning of January 1, gunmen in armored cars marched up to the entrance of a state prison in a Mexican border town. juarez city and lit a fire.

The brazen attack, just hours into the new year, killed 19 people, including 10 guards, and triggered a mass escape of prisoners, including kingpin Ernesto Alfredo Pinón de la Cruz, better known as “El Neto”. also known as. local officials said,

Hundreds of military personnel were sent to the border state of Chihuahua to search for the escapees.

And on January 5, El Neto, the leader of Los Mexicalis, allied with a Ciudad Juárez street gang. sinaloa cartelwas killed in a shootout with the police, the state prosecutor’s office announced in a press release.

Ovidio “El Raton” Guzmán, the son of former Sinaloa Cartel boss Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzmán, was arrested on Thursday. was honored as a major blow by the Mexican authorities For its vast drug-trafficking empire that spans every US state.

Defense Minister Luis Cresencio Sandoval confirmed in a press conference on Friday that nineteen suspected gang members and 10 military personnel were killed during Guzmán’s arrest. Reuters. He also stated that twenty-one other people had been arrested during the 5 January operations and that there were no reports of any civilian deaths.

Mr. Sandoval said Guzmán’s arrest prompted a shootout with gang members; He was later helicoptered out of the house where he was captured and taken to Mexico City.

Mr. Sandoval, now held in a maximum-security federal prison, also said that security in Sinaloa would be increased to protect the public. He said an additional 1,000 military personnel would travel to the area on Friday.

caborca ​​cartel boss rafael caro quinto captured last july It was similarly tortured as another high-profile scalp in the war on Mexico’s drug cartels.

But in a country numb to 16 years of drug-fuelled cartel violence, the arrest or elimination of narco bosses is not a cause for celebration.

more often than not, it brings even more open attacks, As seen in Culiacan, capital of Sinaloan state As soon as the news of the arrest of Ovidio Guzmán spread on Thursday.

Cartel members hijacked trucks and set them on fire, blocked key exits to the city, and fired a volley Spray on an Aeromexico commercial plane at the city’s airport on Thursday.

video footage Passengers shown ducking for cover As the plane was preparing to depart for Mexico City, it was hit by gunfire.

Residents of the city of 800,000 were warned by officials to stay off the streets.

epidemic of violence

According to the Council on Foreign Relations, over 360,000 Mexicans Deaths in drug violence have increased since the government took a more aggressive approach against cartels in 2006.

President Andrés Manuel López Obrador vowed to reduce the death toll by taking the military off the streets when he came to power in 2018.

But like his predecessors, Mr López Obrador has increasingly relied on tactical army units to counter heavily armed cartel members.

According to Mexican government data, 31,127 violent murders will be recorded in Mexico in 2022 alone, or about 86 per day.

on the same weekend in December, a the judge was murdered in the state of Zacatecas, five people killed In a shootout in the Pacific coast city of Acapulco, and members of the Sinaloa Cartel attempted prison break In the central town of Cieneguillas.

addressing the violence at a press conference In late December, Mr López Obrado said his administration had “stopped the upward spiral”.

“We took time because, as I said, of the increased violence dynamics. But (from 2020), it started going down and we propose to reduce it further.

politicians, law enforcement, members of the judiciary, reporters And activists are often deliberately targeted by cartels.

At least 91 politicians, including 36 candidates killed in leadership For the national elections held in June 2021.

Women are particularly at risk. Between 2015 and 2019, cases of murder of women have increased by 145 percent. Los Angeles Times.

As crime rises, shortcomings in the country’s judicial system mean that 95 percent of violent crimes go unpunished, according to a 2021 study by the think tank. Mexico rates,

High-profile cases like the April 2022 murder Debani Escobar, 18, law student Highlighted frustration about the lack of progress in prosecuting violent crime.

Once confined to drug manufacturing areas and border states as cartels fought over valuable drug routes into the US, the violence spread to every corner of the country.

US State Department warns against all travel to six Mexican states; Colima, Guerrero, Michoacan, Sinaloa Tamaulipas and Zacatecas, due to the threat of crime and kidnapping.

Mexico’s unsuccessful war on drug cartels

In 2006, then Mexican President Felipe Calderon Deployed thousands of soldiers in a military crackdown on drug cartels that became known as the start of the “Mexican Drug Wars”.

After initial success in detaining several cartel leaders, violence quickly escalated as the cartels split into new and more violent groups.

official estimates number of drug-related homicides In the years between 2006 and 2012, when Enrique Peña Nieto was elected president, about 50,000. The true number is believed to have been more than double that figure.

Mr. Peña Nieto pursued a policy of all-out war on Mexico’s drug cartels, resulting in thousands of deaths each year.

The United States has provided billions of dollars in arms and training, and has funded development projects to modernize Mexico’s security forces, reform its judicial system, and more. Council on Foreign Relations notes.

Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán was arrested again in 2016 and extradited to the United States in 2017, creating a power vacuum in the Sinaloa Cartel that led to further waves of violence, Los Angeles Times Reported.

Sinaloa state officials warned residents to prepare for increased violence following the arrest of his son, Ovidio Guzmán.