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MEXICO CITY (AP) — The operation to detain Ovidio Guzman, the son of imprisoned drug lord Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman, unleashed firefights that turned the northern metropolis of Culiacan right into a conflict zone with 30 useless, authorities mentioned Friday.
In a blow-by-blow description of the battles Thursday that killed 10 army personnel and 19 suspected members of the Sinaloa drug cartel, Protection Secretary Luis Cresencio Sandoval mentioned cartel gunmen opened hearth on troops with a half-dozen .50-caliber machine weapons.
The military responded by calling in Blackhawk helicopter gunships to assault a convoy of 25 cartel autos, together with truck-mounted cartel gun platforms. The working shootouts additionally killed one Culiacan policeman, and wounded 17 cops and 35 army personnel.
The cartel then opened hearth on the army plane, forcing two of them down with “a big variety of impacts” in every of the 2 plane, Sandoval mentioned. The gang then despatched hordes of gunmen to assault fixed-wing plane, each army and civilian, on the metropolis’s worldwide airport.
One civilian airliner was hit. The gunmen additionally shot up airport buildings in a bid to forestall authorities from flying the captured cartel boss out of town. However, Sandoval mentioned, authorities anticipating the resistance had loaded Ovidio Guzman onto a army helicopter to fly him again to Mexico Metropolis.
The Mexican administration bagged the high-profile cartel determine days earlier than internet hosting U.S. President Joe Biden.
Samuel González, who based Mexico’s particular prosecutor’s workplace for organized crime within the Nineteen Nineties, mentioned Guzmán’s seize was a “reward” forward of Biden’s go to. The Mexican authorities “is working to have a relaxed go to,” he mentioned.
Juan Carlos Ayala, a Culiacan resident and Sinaloa College professor who research the sociology of drug trafficking, mentioned Ovidio Guzmán had been an apparent goal for years.
“Ovidio’s destiny had been determined. Furthermore, he was recognized as the largest trafficker of fentanyl and essentially the most seen Chapos chief.”
Ayala mentioned the environment was calmer Friday, “however there are nonetheless a variety of burned-out autos blocking the streets.”
The scope of Thursday’s violence was such that Sinaloa Gov. Ruben Rocha mentioned cartel gunmen confirmed up at native hospitals, attempting to abduct medical doctors and take them away to deal with wounded fighters. Rocha mentioned that gunmen could be handled in the event that they confirmed up at hospitals, however that gunmen shouldn’t attempt to abduct medical personnel.
“It acquired to the purpose that at one second the medical doctors had been saying, ‘We’re getting out of right here’,” recalled Rocha, saying police bolstered safety and satisfied the medical doctors to remain.
Culiacan residents posted video on social media exhibiting convoys of gunmen in pickup vans and SUVs rolling down boulevards within the metropolis on Thursday. No less than one convoy included a flatbed truck with a mounted gun within the again.
Not like a failed 2019 try to arrest Ovidio Guzman — the federal government mentioned it needed to launch him to keep away from additional bloodshed — this time round there have been fewer civilian casualties, only one 14-year-old boy shot however anticipated to outlive.
One distinction was that the September 2019 raid was within the metropolis of Culiacan itself round noon, whereas Thursday’s raid was round daybreak in a extra sparsely populated space to the north.
Víctor Medrano, director of the Culiacan Chamber of Commerce, mentioned that in 2019 “the whole lot occurred in broad daylight, and we had been caught on the road or at work.”
Whereas most individuals stayed of their houses Thursday, by Friday individuals had been beginning to return out on the streets, Medrano mentioned. “There’s nonetheless some concern … however as they day goes on, there are better variety of individuals out,” he mentioned.
However Sergio Alvarez, head of one other native enterprise chamber, mentioned that in some sense the results of Thursday’s violence had been better. “There have been blockades throughout the entire metropolis.”
Ismael Bojórquez, director of the crusading native newspaper Ríodoce, mentioned the cartel seems to have solely grown stronger since 2019, when 13 individuals had been killed within the failed raid.
“They (cartels) have taken benefit of those 4 years to prepare themselves, arm themselves, strengthen their buildings, their funds,” he mentioned. “I consider there are extra weapons than three years in the past. All of organized crime’s armies have strengthened, not simply the Chapitos, and that is the worth that society is paying for this technique of the federal authorities.”
Thursday’s violence was uncommon in that it additionally focused and compelled the closure of Culiacan’s airport, the place one army airplane and a civilian airliner had been hit by bullets.
The industrial flight waited for its probability to take off as two massive army planes landed with troops.
When the airliner was lastly making ready to speed up, passengers heard gunshots within the distance. Inside 15 seconds the sound was out of the blue extra intense and far nearer, and passengers threw themselves to the ground, some mentioned.
They mentioned they didn’t know the airplane had been hit by gunfire till a flight attendant informed them. Nobody was injured, however the airplane rapidly retreated to the terminal.
Guzmán was indicted by the USA on drug trafficking prices in 2018. Based on each governments, he had assumed a rising position amongst his brothers in carrying on their father’s enterprise, together with long- time cartel boss Ismael “El Mayo” Zambada.
International Affairs Secretary Marcelo Ebrard confirmed that the federal government had acquired a request in 2019 from the USA for Guzmán’s arrest for functions of extradition. He mentioned that request must be up to date and processed, however he added that first an open case in Mexico awaits Guzmán.
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Related Press writers Fabiola Sánchez and Christopher Sherman contributed to this report.
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