(Mexico City) The Mexican public prosecutor’s office on Thursday asked the United States for explanations regarding drug trafficker Ovidio Guzman, son of Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman, amid alleged intrigues within the Sinaloa Cartel.
Arrested in Mexico in January 2023 and extradited to the United States last September, Ovidio Guzman, 34, was released from prison on July 23, the public prosecutor’s office said in a statement.
Two days later, one of his father’s long-standing collaborators in the Sinaloa Cartel, Ismael “El Mayo” Zambada, was arrested in the southern United States on the border with Mexico along with another of El Chapo’s sons, Joaquin Guzman. The United States offered $15 million in exchange for his arrest.
In a letter, “El Mayo” Zambada claims to have been “kidnapped” and delivered to the United States by Joaquin Guzman Lopez. Mexican justice also accuses Joaquin Guzman Lopez of having betrayed “Mayo” Zambada by putting him on a private plane bound for the southern United States.
According to analysts such as former US Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) agent Mike Vigil, he allegedly handed Zambada over to US justice in exchange for benefits for his brother and himself.
In the midst of this imbroglio, the Mexican public prosecutor’s office raised its voice, considering that it was “essential to urgently obtain” information on Ovidio Guzman.
The US ambassador to Mexico, Ken Salazar, a politician close to President Joe Biden, assured that Ovidio Guzman remained under surveillance (“custodia”, which also means “custody”) in the United States, without giving further details.
The Mexican justice system is also “urgently” requesting information from Washington on the plane in which Zambada, Guzman Lepez and the pilot or pilots who disappeared traveled.
The plane’s landing “was authorized by the competent agencies” of the United States, according to Mexican authorities.
On Thursday, shootings were reported in the state of Sinaloa, a stronghold of the Cartel. Gunmen attacked military personnel, the local security department reported on the social network X.
Roadblocks were reported in the Sinaloa capital, Culiacan, the same place where Ovidio Guzman was arrested in January 2023.
These disturbances are added to the dozen assassinations recorded in Sinaloa in recent days, which the authorities link to the arrest of Ismael “El Mayo” Zambada and Joaquín Guzmán López in the United States on July 25.