Mexican president blames US for increased drug cartel violence

Mexican President Andrés Manuel Lopez Obrador has accused the United States of sharing responsibility for the escalating violence by the Sinaloa cartel in the past week, which has left dozens of people dead.

The “instability and clashes” have left 53 dead in the northern state of Sinaloa, the president said at his morning press conference, blaming a “totally illegal” operation orchestrated by US forces.

On September 9, fighting broke out between rival factions of the Sinaloa cartel, leaving 51 people missing and violence continuing to show no signs of abating.

How the violence broke out

Violence between the two dominant factions of the Sinaloa cartel began in July, when Ismael “El Mayo” Zambada, the top drug trafficker and leader of one of the groups, was arrested in the US.

Zambada accused a high-ranking member of Los Chapitos, another faction of the cartel, of kidnapping him and forcing him to travel to the United States.

Lopez Obrador said the U.S. bears some responsibility for the violence “because we carried out the operation” to arrest Zambada. He stressed that the arrest “caused the confrontation that is now happening in Sinaloa.”

The trafficker was arrested along with Joaquin Guzman Lopez, a son of Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman, who is currently serving a life sentence in the United States.

Since September 9, shootings in the capital Culiacan have forced schools to close on some days and restaurants and shops to close early.

“If it is said that the United States, that is, us, are responsible for what is happening in Sinaloa or elsewhere, I do not agree with that,” said Ken Salazar, the U.S. ambassador to Mexico City, according to Mexican media reports, denying the U.S. role in fueling the cartel’s violence.

US judge again blocks Mexico’s $10 billion arms trade lawsuit

In 2022, a US judge ruled in favor of the majority of Mexico’s $10 Billion Lawsuit which aimed to hold American gun manufacturers accountable for facilitating the trafficking of firearms to violent drug cartels across the U.S.-Mexico border, particularly through Massachusetts.

U.S. District Judge Dennis Saylor in Boston has dropped charges against six of the eight suspects. Companies sued by Mexico in 2021, including giants Sturm, Ruger and Glock, on the pretext of jurisdictional issues.

He described the companies’ ties to the state of Massachusetts as “tenuous at best,” explaining that none of the six companies were incorporated in the state. Saylor said Mexico could not prove that firearms sold in Massachusetts caused harm to the country.

Although Mexico argued that it was statistically likely that some firearms sold in Massachusetts were later illegally smuggled into Mexico, Saylor argued that the country did not provide sufficient evidence to establish jurisdiction.

Mexico accused the gun manufacturers of deliberately undermining its strict gun laws by designing, marketing and distributing military-style assault weapons, knowing that this would eventually arm drug cartels, leading to violence, extortion and kidnappings.

The country claimed that more than 500,000 weapons are smuggled from the United States to Mexico, more than 68% of which were made by the companies it sued. This has led to high gun deaths, reduced investment and economic activity, and increased spending on law enforcement and public safety.