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MEXICO-CRIME-UNREST-DRUGS
Fierce gun battle rocks El Chapo’s bastion in Mexico
CULIACAN, Mexico, Oct 18, 2019 (BSS/AFP) – Heavily armed gunmen in four-
by-four trucks fought an intense battle against Mexican security forces
Thursday in the city of Culiacan, capital of jailed kingpin Joaquin “El
Chapo” Guzman’s home state of Sinaloa.
Sustained, heavy gunfire ground the western city of 750,000 people to a
halt, in a battle that left blazing vehicles strewn across the street and
sent terrified residents running for shelter, said AFP journalists at the
scene.
Images carried on Mexican television showed army and police forces under
assault by civilians armed with heavy machine guns.
Mexican TV network Milenio said the shootout was triggered by the arrest
of Ovidio Guzman, one of the sons of “El Chapo,” who have assumed control of
part of the cartel since their father was extradited to the United States in
2017.
Other media reports said one of Guzman’s sons had been killed.
Authorities did not immediately confirm or deny either report.
President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador said in a brief comment to
journalists that his security cabinet was holding a meeting and would give
details on the situation later.
The Sinaloa state government said police officers had been wounded, but
did not give a detailed toll.
It also said some inmates had escaped from the Aguaruto prison in Culiacan
amid the chaos, but did not say how many.
It said in a statement that it was “working to restore calm and order in
the face of the high-impact incidents that have occurred in recent hours in
various points around Culiacan.”
It called on residents to “remain calm, stay off the streets and be very
attentive to official advisories on the evolving situation.”
The battle broke out in the afternoon near the state prosecutor’s office,
when masked gunmen blocked traffic and opened fire, causing panicked drivers
to abandon their cars in the middle of the street.
The fighting then spread to several other parts of the city.
Gunmen blocked roads and highways around the city into the evening,
bringing the capital to a standstill.
– Drug trafficking bastion –
“El Chapo,” 62, was sentenced to life in prison in July for trafficking
hundreds of tons of cocaine, heroin, methamphetamine and marijuana into the
United States over the course of a quarter-century.
However, his Sinaloa cartel remains one of the most powerful in Mexico.
Guzman’s extradition unleashed an initial period of instability in the
group, as his sons waged war with his cartel co-founder, Ismael “El Mayo”
Zambada, for control, leaving a trail of bodies in their wake.
But the situation has since stabilized into a reluctant truce.
Guzman — whose nickname translates as “Shorty” — is considered the most
powerful drug lord since Colombia’s Pablo Escobar, who was killed in a police
shootout in 1993.
After being convicted in a New York court, he is now serving his sentence
in the notorious ADX federal maximum security prison in the US state of
Colorado, nicknamed the “Alcatraz of the Rockies.”
BSS/AFP/ARS/0928 hrs