On Monday, February 17th, Mexico announced the seizure of 440 pounds of methamphetamine in a cartel heartland, as it comes under mounting pressure from President Trump to tackle drug trafficking.
The discovery was made during a weekend operation to dismantle illegal drug laboratories in the northwestern state of Sinaloa, a government statement said.
The value of the drugs seized was nearly $40 million, it said, adding that more than 3,170 gallons of chemical precursors used to make methamphetamine were also confiscated
The Latin American nation has announced a series of major drug discoveries in recent weeks in an apparent attempt to highlight increased efforts to combat drug smuggling.
Trump has cited illegal flows of the deadly opioid fentanyl as one of the reasons for a threatened 25% tariff on Mexican goods.
He put the trade levies on hold for a month, until early March, after Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum agreed to deploy 10,000 more soldiers to the countries’ shared border to tackle smuggling.
Since February 5, when the deployment began, Mexican authorities have seized 4.9 tons of methamphetamine, 453 kilos of cocaine, 55 kilos of fentanyl and 489 firearms, the government said.
Last month, Mexico’s government announced that it had seized 18 kilos of fentanyl hidden in a bus, and in December, the government announced what it called “the largest seizure of fentanyl in history,” totaling more than one million pills.
The synthetic opioid, which is 50 times more potent than heroin, has been linked to tens of thousands of overdose deaths in the United States.
Mexico is one of the main trafficking routes for the drug and for the chemicals to manufacture it, most of which come from China, according to U.S. authorities.
The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration said that Mexican cartels are “at the heart” of a synthetic narcotics crisis in the United States. The powerful Sinaloa Cartel “dominates the fentanyl market through its manipulation of the global supply chain and the proliferation of clandestine fentanyl labs in Mexico,” it said in its 2024 National Drug Threat Assessment.
But Sheinbaum has said authorities have found no proof that fentanyl is being produced in the country.
Last week, Sheinbaum warned U.S. gunmakers they could face fresh legal action and be deemed accomplices if Washington designates Mexican drug cartels as terrorist groups.
“If they declare these criminal groups as terrorists, then we’ll have to expand our U.S. lawsuit,” Sheinbaum said at a daily press conference.
A new charge could include alleged “complicity” of gunmakers with terror groups, she said.
With information from the Associated Press
TYT Newsroom
