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Former Mexican Defense Secretary Salvador Cienfuegos Zepeda was arrested at Los Angeles International Airport on a Drug Enforcement Administration warrant, three U.S. law enforcement officials told NBC News late Thursday. The arrest was confirmed by Mexico’s Foreign Minister Marcelo Ebrard via Twitter, who said he was informed of the detention by the U.S. Ambassador to Mexico, Christopher Landau.
Nine members of a Mormon family – three mums and six children – were killed in a massacre in Mexico when they were allegedly caught in the crossfire of rival drug cartels. Seventeen members of the prominent Lebaron Mormon community were apparently travelling to a wedding in a convoy of SUVs when they were “ambushed” about 70 miles south of the US border.
President Trump announced on Monday that he alerted US military that the migrant caravan approaching from Mexico constituted a ‘national emergency,’ asserting that aid to Guatemala, El Salvador, and Honduras will be cut off. The National Hurricane Center (NHC) warned of ‘potentially catastrophic’ Hurricane Wilma which is set to make landfall in Mexico on Tuesday.
Nearly 62,000 people have gone missing in Mexico – with most of those disappearing during the six years of the country’s bloody war on drug cartels. Initial figures released last year suggest 41,000 were unaccounted for – but that number has now increased by around 50%. Officials have so far discovered 1,124 corpses in 873 clandestine burial pits. Sites are frequently used by drug and kidnapping gangs to dispose of the bodies of their victims or rivals.
Clashes sparked by suspected cartel gunmen in a northern Mexican town killed 20 people this weekend, authorities said, putting more pressure on Mexico’s president to curb gang violence after the United States vowed to label the gangs terrorists. Killings clouded celebrations marking Lopez Obrador’s first year in office, which were buffeted by a march in Mexico City by thousands of people protesting the violence.
Former Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto accepted a $100m bribe from drug cartel kingpin Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán, a witness has testified. Alex Cifuentes, who says he was a close associate of Guzmán for years, told a New York City courtroom that he had told authorities of the bribe in 2016. Guzmán is accused of being behind the Sinaloa drug cartel, which prosecutors say was the largest US drug supplier. Mr Peña Nieto served as the president of Mexico from 2012 to 2018.
Recently sworn-in Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador will sell the Boeing Co. 787 Dreamliner which transported his predecessor in a deal that will generate a multimillion-dollar loss. Mexico is likely to get $76 million less than it paid. The sale is an attempt by the president to move Mexico away from excess.
Mexico’s government announced on Tuesday that Jared Kushner the son-in-law of President Trump will be bestowed with the country’s top honor for foreigners. Kushner will join the Order of the Aztec Eagle due to ‘his significant contributions’ to a new North American trade pact finalized in August. Kushner will receive the award on Thursday.
The US ambassador to Mexico, Roberta Jacobson, announced Thursday, that she will resign from her post in May, in another high-level official State Department departure. Jacobson, who took the post in 2016, is an experienced diplomat and Latin America, expert. Jacobson’s departure could lead to a further deterioration of relations between the US and Mexico.
Mexican authorities on Thursday adopted tougher measures against Central American migrants, detaining 800 of them who had entered Mexico illegally from Guatemala intending to reach the border with the United States. Mexico is under intense pressure from U.S. President Donald Trump to contain mass movements of migrants, most of them from Central America, who have been crossing through Mexico on their way to the U.S. border.