The Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) has sent requests to the Government of Mexico to deliver samples of the drugs that have been seized in the country. However, the responses obtained by the US agency have been negative.
In the case of organized crime, the maximum term for preliminary detention is ten days; and for crimes of terrorism, espionage or illicit drug trafficking it is fifteen days.
The petitions, addressed to the Attorney General of the Republic (FGR), aim to analyze in specialized laboratories in the United States (USA) the illegal substances that enter Mexico, such as methamphetamine, cocaine and fentanyl. This in order to determine what kind of chemical precursors are used in their production, the route they follow and the countries that export them.
Either through emails or diplomatic notes, the DEA has sought the cooperation of the FGR for the delivery of said samples. However, the Mexican authorities have not allowed him access to the drugs that have been seized in national territory, as confirmed by agents from the neighboring country to Milenio.
The foregoing would have to do with an alleged blockade imposed on the DEA since Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO) assumed the Presidency of Mexico in December 2018. For this reason, the drugs seized on Aztec lands have not been able to be analyzed in the US.
An official of the Government of Joe Biden -whose identity was kept confidential- commented to the aforementioned media that the only thing they are looking for with the analysis of narcotic drugs is to combat the public health problem that exists in the US, for which he assured that they do not ask for nothing in return.
Despite Mexico’s refusal, the authorities of the neighboring country have shown their willingness to cooperate in the fight against drugs, since it is a regional matter that affects both countries.
In the last four years (from December 2018 to July 2023), federal forces seized more than 7,500 kilos of fentanyl, 293 tons of methamphetamine and 158 tons of cocaine in Mexico, according to data presented in the Fifth Government Report.
But the drug the US is targeting is primarily fentanyl, a synthetic opioid that can be up to 50 times more potent than heroin and 100 times more potent than morphine. The consumption of this substance has caused a wave of overdoses among US citizens, due to its high degree of addiction and lethality.
In Mexico, the criminal organizations that are dedicated to fentanyl trafficking are the Sinaloa Cartel and the Jalisco Nueva Generación Cartel (CJNG). That is why the DEA has among its list of the most wanted fugitives the leaders of both groups, such as Iván Archivaldo Guzmán and Nemesio Oseguera Cervantes, alias “El Mencho”.
Although the DEA has not been able to analyze the fentanyl seized in Mexican territory, its reports indicate that the chemical precursors used in the manufacture of said opioid are shipped from China. President López Obrador even sent a letter to President Xi Jinping in April to request more control over the trafficking of this substance.
Meanwhile, seizures of synthetic drugs continue in Mexico. The most recent occurred in early September on a highway in Ahome, Sinaloa, where federal agents seized nearly 2,600,000 fentanyl pills.
Source: Infobae
