Mexican soldiers have detained an alleged drug cartel boss, the military said on Sunday, marking the first major arrest since President Felipe Calderon sent thousands of troops to restore order in a western state terrorized by drug gangs.
Elias Valencia, an alleged head of the Valencia Cartel, was arrested along with four other people at a mountain ranch near the town of Aguililla on Friday, said General Cornelio Casio, one of the officials in charge of the anti-drug offensive.
Last week, Calderon ordered more than 6,000 soldiers, marines and federal police to his native state of Michoacan, which has seen a wave of drug-related killings and beheadings.
Officials blame the violence on a turf war between the Valencia and Gulf cartels over lucrative marijuana plantations and smuggling routes for cocaine and methamphetamine to the US.
Mexican investigators allege that Elias Valencia is one of several figures who have run the cartel since his father, Armando Valencia, was arrested in 2003.
Casio said Elias Valencia and the others were arrested with several hundred kilograms of marijuana and an arsenal of firearms, adding that they attempted to flee but were captured.
Authorities say Aguililla, some 200km southwest of the state capital of Morelia, has been a key stronghold of the Valencia Cartel. Assailants recently killed 10 police in two attacks on winding highways nearby that offer perfect terrain for ambushes.
In the new offensive, soldiers supported by armored vehicles and helicopters have combed the area for wanted traffickers and drug plantations.
Calderon -- who was narrowly elected in July on a pro-business, law-and-order platform and took office Dec. 1 -- has vowed a nationwide battle against drug violence that has claimed more than 2,000 lives this year.
On Wednesday, troops in Michoacan clashed with alleged traffickers protecting a marijuana plantation, killing one man and arresting another. On Saturday, soldiers arrested a man alleged to be a key Sinaloa Cartel lieutenant in the western city of Guadalajara.
But many security experts say it will take more than brute force stop the cartels, who earn a great deal supplying the US markets.
Former Mexican president Vicente Fox sent thousands of troops to battle drug gangs, accelerated drug seizures and arrested several high-profile traffickers without making much of a dent on the quantity of narcotics crossing into the US.
Critics of Fox's crackdown say it created a power vacuum in the cartels as rivals fought to replace the arrested leaders.
South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol on Tuesday declared martial law in an unannounced late night address broadcast live on YTN television. Yoon said he had no choice but to resort to such a measure in order to safeguard free and constitutional order, saying opposition parties have taken hostage of the parliamentary process to throw the country into a crisis. "I declare martial law to protect the free Republic of Korea from the threat of North Korean communist forces, to eradicate the despicable pro-North Korean anti-state forces that are plundering the freedom and happiness of our people, and to protect the free
A string of rape and assault allegations against the son of Norway’s future queen have plunged the royal family into its “biggest scandal” ever, wrapping up an annus horribilis for the monarchy. The legal troubles surrounding Marius Borg Hoiby, the 27-year-old son born of a relationship before Norwegian Crown Princess Mette-Marit’s marriage to Norwegian Crown Prince Haakon, have dominated the Scandinavian country’s headlines since August. The tall strapping blond with a “bad boy” look — often photographed in tuxedos, slicked back hair, earrings and tattoos — was arrested in Oslo on Aug. 4 suspected of assaulting his girlfriend the previous night. A photograph
‘GOOD POLITICS’: He is a ‘pragmatic radical’ and has moderated his rhetoric since the height of his radicalism in 2014, a lecturer in contemporary Islam said Abu Mohammed al-Jolani is the leader of the Islamist alliance that spearheaded an offensive that rebels say brought down Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and ended five decades of Baath Party rule in Syria. Al-Jolani heads Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), which is rooted in Syria’s branch of al-Qaeda. He is a former extremist who adopted a more moderate posture in order to achieve his goals. Yesterday, as the rebels entered Damascus, he ordered all military forces in the capital not to approach public institutions. Last week, he said the objective of his offensive, which saw city after city fall from government control, was to
The US deployed a reconnaissance aircraft while Japan and the Philippines sent navy ships in a joint patrol in the disputed South China Sea yesterday, two days after the allied forces condemned actions by China Coast Guard vessels against Philippine patrol ships. The US Indo-Pacific Command said the joint patrol was conducted in the Philippines’ exclusive economic zone by allies and partners to “uphold the right to freedom of navigation and overflight “ and “other lawful uses of the sea and international airspace.” Those phrases are used by the US, Japan and the Philippines to oppose China’s increasingly aggressive actions in the
RSS