Mexico's president blames US for cartel killings as violence escalates in Sinaloa after leaders arrested

Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador on Thursday blamed the United States in part for the rise in cartel violence that has terrorized the northern state of Sinaloa and left at least 30 people dead in the past week.

Two rival factions of the Sinaloa cartel have clashed in the capital city of Culiacán. It appears to be a power struggle since two of the cartel's leaders were arrested in the USA at the end of July. Groups of armed men have shot at themselves and at the security forces.

Meanwhile, bodies continued to turn up across the city. On one busy street corner, cars drove past pools of blood leading to a body in an auto repair shop, while heavily armed police in black masks loaded up another body sprawled on a side street in Sinaloa.

When asked whether the US government was “partly responsible” for the violence in Sinaloa, the president replied at his morning briefing: “Yes, of course … for carrying out this operation.”

The recent increase in cartel wars was expected after Joaquín Guzmán López, a son of the former leader of the Sinaloa cartel Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzmanlanded near El Paso, Texas on July 25 in a small plane with Ismael “El Mayo” Zambada.

Zambada was the cartel's oldest figure and a reclusive leader. After his arrest, he said in a letter distributed by his lawyer that he was kidnapped by the younger Guzmán and brought to the United States against his will. Zambada pleaded last week in new York in a drug trafficking case in which he is accused of involvement in murder plots and ordering torture.

On Thursday afternoon, another military operation hit the north of Culiacán with military and regional helicopters.

In Culiacán, traffic was heavy and most schools were open, although parents still weren't sending their children to class. Shops still close early and few people venture out after dark. While the city slowly reopens and soldiers patrol the streets, many families remain in hiding as parents and teachers fear being caught in the crossfire.

“Where is the safety for our children, for ourselves, for all citizens? It is so dangerous here, you don't want to go out,” a mother from Culiacán told the Associated Press.

The mother, who did not want to give her name for fear of the cartels, said that although some schools had recently reopened, she had not allowed her daughter to go there for two weeks. She said she was frightened when armed men stopped a taxi they were travelling in on their way home and terrified her child.

“Hugs instead of bullets”

During his morning press conference, López Obrador claimed that American authorities had “carried out this operation” to arrest Zambada. “It was totally illegal and agents from the Department of Justice were waiting for Mr. Mayo.”

“If we are now facing instability and clashes in Sinaloa, it is because they (the American government) made that decision,” he said.

He added that “there can be no cooperative relationship when they make unilateral decisions” like this one. Mexican prosecutors have said they are considering filing treason charges against those involved in the plan to capture Zambada.

The President-elect joined him. Claudia Sheinbaumwho said later in the day: “We can never accept that there is no communication or cooperation.”

It is the latest escalation of tensions in relations between the United States and Mexico. Last month, the Mexican president said he would “put on hold” relations with the US and Canadian embassies after ambassadors criticized his controversial plan to reform the Mexican judicial system and require all judges to run for office.

Still, Zambada's arrest has fueled criticism of López Obrador, who has refused to confront the cartels throughout his term in office, calling his strategy “hugs instead of bullets.” On previous occasions, he has falsely claimed that the cartels respect Mexican citizens and mostly fight among themselves.

Although the president, who leaves office at the end of the month, has promised his plan will reduce cartel violence, such clashes remain a plague in Mexico. The cartels are using an increasingly wide range of tactics, including roadside bombs or IEDs, trenches, homemade armored vehicles and drones that drop bombs.

Last week, López Obrador publicly called on the warring factions in the Sinaloa conflict to act “responsibly” and stressed that he believed the cartels would listen to him. But the bloodshed continued.

In a strange turnLast month, Mexican prosecutors said they would file charges against Guzmán for allegedly kidnapping Zambada, but they also cited another count in Mexico's penal code that defines his actions as treason.

Nowhere in the statement is it mentioned that the younger Guzmán was a member of the Chapitos faction (the “little Chapos”) of the Sinaloa cartel, which consists of Chapo’s sons and smuggles millions of doses of the deadly opioid fentanyl into the United States, resulting in about 70,000 overdose deaths each year. According to a 2023 U.S. Department of Justice indictment, the Chapitos and their cartel members used corkscrews, electric shocks and hot chilies to torment their rivals while some of their victims were “thrown dead or alive to the tigers to be eaten.”

El Chapo, the founder of the Sinaloa cartel, is serving a life sentence in a maximum security prison in Colorado after convicted in 2019 on charges including drug trafficking, money laundering and weapons offenses.

Last year El Chapo sent an “SOS” message to the Mexican president, claiming that he had been subjected to “psychological torture” in prison.