US says El Chapo’s son has surrendered, but El Mayo was taken from Mexico against his will – DNyuz

The U.S. ambassador to Mexico has acknowledged that drug lord Ismael “El Mayo” Zambada Garcia was brought to the United States against his will when he arrived in Texas in July on a plane with fellow drug lord Joaquin Guzman Lopez, son of notorious cartel leader “El Chapo.”

Zambada Garcia’s lawyer previously alleged that El Mayo, 76 and longtime leader of the Sinaloa drug cartel, was kidnapped from Mexico by Guzman Lopez and six men in military uniforms and flown to the U.S. against his will.

U.S. Ambassador Ken Salazar said Friday that “the evidence we saw … is that they took El Mayo Zambada against his will.”

“This was an operation between cartels, where one turned in the other,” Salazar said, adding that no US assets were involved in the importation of El Mayo into the country.

The Guzman family’s lawyer denies there was a kidnapping and calls it a voluntary surrender after lengthy negotiations.

El Mayo’s arrest has fueled fears in Mexico of a new wave of violence and instability, as well as a possible deterioration in relations with the United States. The ambassador’s statement came hours after Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador complained that “there is no cooperation” from Washington to clarify the circumstances surrounding the arrests of Zambada Garcia and Guzman Lopez.

“They have not given us enough information,” Lopez Obrador said at a news conference on Friday.

Salazar said no U.S. personnel, assets or aircraft were involved in the flight on which Guzman Lopez turned himself in, and that U.S. officials were “surprised” when the elderly Zambada Garcia also showed up at an airport outside El Paso, Texas, on July 25.

Zambada Garcia’s faction within the Sinaloa Cartel was engaged in fierce factional fighting with El Chapo’s sons, including Guzman Lopez, the half-brother of the faction’s leaders.

Guzman Lopez, 38, had apparently been negotiating with U.S. authorities for some time about possibly turning himself in. He has pleaded not guilty to drug trafficking and other charges in federal court in Chicago.

U.S. officials said they had virtually no warning when Guzman Lopez’s plane landed at an airport near El Paso last month.

It has been suggested that Guzman Lopez planned to turn himself in and that he took Zambada Garcia with him to obtain more favorable treatment from U.S. authorities. However, his motives remain unclear.

Zambada Garcia was sentenced to life in prison by a US court in 2019. He is said to be more involved in the day-to-day operations of the Sinaloa cartel than his former, more famous boss El Chapo.

Zambada Garcia has been charged in a number of U.S. cases, including in New York and California. Prosecutors also filed a new charge against him in New York in February.

Amid fears of rising violence between drug gangs, President Lopez Obrador made an unusual appeal to drug cartels not to fight each other.

The news US reports that El Chapo’s son has surrendered, but El Mayo was taken from Mexico against his will first appeared on Al Jazeera.