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Tag: drug cartel

  • Trump declares Venezuela airspace ‘closed in its entirety’ as tensions with U.S. escalate

    The USS Gerald R. Ford is the world’s largest aircraft carrier.

    The USS Gerald R. Ford is the world’s largest aircraft carrier.

    U.S. Navy

    President Donald Trump jolted an already-tense standoff with Venezuela on Saturday morning, declaring on his Truth Social account that all airspace “above and surrounding Venezuela” should be considered “closed in its entirety.”

    Addressing “Airlines, Pilots, Drug Dealers, and Human Traffickers,” he offered no operational details but warned that the directive required immediate attention. The statement landed amid a rapid escalation in U.S. military posture toward Caracas and mounting fears of conflict across the Caribbean.

    “To all Airlines, Pilots, Drug Dealers, and Human Traffickers, please consider THE AIRSPACE ABOVE AND SURROUNDING VENEZUELA TO BE CLOSED IN ITS ENTIRETY. Thank you for your attention to this matter!,” Trump wrote.

    Trump’s declaration capped a week in which his administration signaled it is preparing a more assertive phase of operations targeting Venezuela’s so-called Cartel de los Soles., which according to Washington is headed by strongman Nicolás Maduro and top members of his regime.

    On Thursday, the president announced that U.S. military actions—until now focused on sinking speedboats suspected of carrying drugs in the Caribbean—would soon move onto Venezuelan territory. Speaking to service members during a Thanksgiving call, he said the U.S. Armed Forces would “very soon” begin land-based efforts to disrupt what he characterized as Venezuelan drug-trafficking networks.

    Members of the US Marine Corps, Marine Fighter Attack Squadron 225, work at José Aponte de la Torre Airport, formerly Roosevelt Roads Naval Station, on September 13, 2025 in Ceiba, Puerto Rico. President Donald Trump is sending ten F-35 fighter jets to Puerto Rico as part of his war on drug cartels, sources familiar with the matter told AFP on September 5, as tensions mount with Venezuela over Washington's military build-up in the Caribbean. The planes will join US warships already deployed to the southern Caribbean as Trump steps up pressure on Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, whom the United States accuses of leading a drug cartel. The Trump administration recently carried out a drone strike in the southern Caribbean against a boat that had left Venezuela and was suspected of transporting drugs. Eleven people died in the attack. The president claimed that the vessel was operated by the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua. (Photo by Miguel J. Rodriguez Carrillo / AFP) (Photo by MIGUEL J. RODRIGUEZ CARRILLO/AFP via Getty Images)
    Members of the U.S. Marine Corps, Marine Fighter Attack Squadron 225, work at Jose Aponte de la Torre Airport on Sept. 13, 2025 in Ceiba, Puerto Rico. President Donald Trump was sending 10 F-35 fighter jets to Puerto Rico as part of his war on drug cartels, sources familiar with the matter told AFP, as tensions mount with Venezuela over Washington’s military build-up in the Caribbean. MIGUEL J. RODRIGUEZ CARRILLO AFP via Getty Images

    He said maritime operations had already destroyed more than 20 vessels and resulted in more than 80 deaths since Sept. 1, claiming the United States had halted “85%” of the maritime flow. Venezuelan groups, he said, were “sending poison” northward that kills “thousands of people a year.”

    Despite the sharper rhetoric and growing U.S. military buildup in the Caribbean, quiet diplomatic contacts have taken place between Washington and Caracas in recent days, according to news reports. Whether those conversations can restrain the accelerating confrontation remains unclear.

    Washington has simultaneously sought to expand its legal authority. On Monday, the State Department formally designated the Cartel de los Soles a Foreign Terrorist Organization, placing Maduro, Interior Minister Diosdado Cabello and Defense Minister Vladimir Padrino López in the same legal category as leaders of al-Qaeda and ISIS.

    The designation, published in the Federal Register, is seen as an instrument that grants the administration new latitude to take military action without additional congressional approval.

    Analysts say the move is sweeping in scope. Because U.S. officials argue that the cartel operates from within the Venezuelan state, the designation effectively treats the Maduro government as part of a terrorist network.

    Experts note the measure could allow the administration to invoke the 2001 Authorization for the Use of Military Force, the law underpinning most U.S. counterterrorism operations over the past two decades. U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said the designation “opens up a lot of new options,” and Trump has suggested it could permit strikes on Venezuelan assets and infrastructure. He has also said he remains open to negotiation.

    Caracas denounced the move, calling it a false pretext for foreign intervention and insisting the cartel is an American invention. “It is foolish for the Venezuelan government to waste part of its valuable governing time responding to these slanders and calumnies,” the Venezuelan Foreign Ministry said Monday, adding that Venezuelans remained “united and cohesive” and were preparing for Christmas festivities.

    The expanding U.S. legal framework has coincided with a significant buildup of military hardware near Venezuela’s borders. For more than two months, American naval and air assets have surged into the Caribbean, including the Nov. 16 arrival of the USS Gerald R. Ford—the world’s largest aircraft carrier. At least 10 additional warships, a nuclear submarine and F-35 fighter jets are also deployed. U.S. commanders say the missions support counter-narcotics operations, but regional observers note the level of firepower far exceeds typical interdiction activity.

    Inside Venezuela, the sense of crisis has deepened. Maduro has repeatedly claimed the United States is attempting to overthrow him, and in recent days his government has urged citizens and the armed forces to prepare for “prolonged resistance” should an invasion occur.

    Defense Minister Padrino accused Washington of staging provocations, citing U.S. military exercises in neighboring Trinidad and Tobago. “No threat, no air-naval deployment, however powerful or intimidating, can take away Venezuela’s right to continue on its path of freedom and independence,” he said recently on state television.

    Beyond the military realm, the rising tension has triggered swift regional consequences. Concerned about the security situation in the Caribbean, six airlines suspended their routes to Venezuela over the weekend after the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) issued a warning urging aircraft to “exercise extreme caution” in and around Venezuelan airspace. Iberia of Spain, Portugal’s TAP, Colombia’s Avianca, Trinidad and Tobago’s Caribbean Airlines, Brazil’s GOL and Chile’s LATAM halted flights, said Marisela de Loaiza, president of the Venezuelan Association of Airlines. She provided no timeline for the resumption of service.

    The FAA cited “worsening security conditions and increased military activity” in the region and warned that the risks “could pose a potential danger to aircraft at all altitudes, including during overflight, arrival and departure phases, and to airports and aircraft on the ground.”

    Human-rights groups have raised alarms over the lethality of recent U.S. maritime interdictions. Since early September, U.S. forces have carried out at least 21 strikes against suspected drug-trafficking vessels in the Caribbean and Pacific, leaving at least 83 people dead. Advocacy organizations describe the killings as extrajudicial, while some regional governments worry Washington may be operating close to—or beyond—international legal boundaries.

    This story was originally published November 29, 2025 at 9:50 AM.

    Antonio Maria Delgado

    el Nuevo Herald

    Galardonado periodista con más de 30 años de experiencia, especializado en la cobertura de temas sobre Venezuela. Amante de la historia y la literatura.

    Antonio María Delgado

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  • 5 people accused of stashing 1,000 lbs. of meth in DeKalb Co. for drug cartel

    5 people accused of stashing 1,000 lbs. of meth in DeKalb Co. for drug cartel

    Five people are in jail, accused of stashing 1,000 pounds of meth for a notorious drug cartel from Mexico known as Cartel de Jalisco Nueva Generación.

    Federal agents said the suspects hid the drugs in two different homes. Agents seized 700 pounds of meth from an apartment at a complex called Indigo on Northwest Expressway.

    And 300 pounds were found inside a home on Hairston Crossing Trail in Stone Mountain, according to agents.

    Four children were also living in the homes where the drugs were stored.

    “Wow. See, I just thought they were a normal family,” one Stone Mountain neighbor told Channel 2’s Courtney Francisco.

    She asked Channel 2 not to share her name in fear of retaliation, but she said she never would have suspected the family was possibly connected to a drug cartel.

    [DOWNLOAD: Free WSB-TV News app for alerts as news breaks]

    “They looked like a normal family. They had children, you know. I seen a wife, friends come over,” she said.

    The same situation played out in the Indigo apartment complex, according to investigators. That’s where they seized 700 pounds of meth in a home where two children were living.

    “Talk about true innocence. They got brought here,” said Robert Murphy.

    He’s the special agent in charge of the Drug Enforcement Administration’s Atlanta Division.

    “It’s done on purpose. They send the family on purpose. The cartels aren’t stupid. They want them to blend in so you see them as your neighbors, you see the kids playing out front. They’re not calling attention to themselves,” said Murphy.

    After three days’ worth of undercover work, investigators showed up at the two stash houses, seized all the meth, arrested four men and a woman, and took four children from the homes.

    Wilber Castellanos Villazana, 38, Yamilet Calixto Sotelo 22, Jorge Lorenzo Manzanarez, 35, Esteban Jacobo-Suarez, 44, and Damien Gomez-Guijarro, 32, who are all citizens of Mexico, face charges of possession with the intent to distribute methamphetamine in federal criminal complaints.

    Castallanos Villazana, Calixto Sotelo, Lorenzo Manzanarez, and Jacobo-Suarez are from Mexico and did not have proper paperwork to enter the U.S. Jacobo-Suarez was previously deported from the United States twice. Gomez-Guijarro was authorized to be in the U.S.

    These cases are being investigated by the Drug Enforcement Administration and Atlanta-Carolinas High Intensity Drug Trafficking Areas (HIDTA) program, with valuable assistance provided by Homeland Security Investigations, the DeKalb County Police Department, and the Gwinnett County Sheriff’s Office.

    Assistant United States Attorney Michael Herskowitz is prosecuting the cases.

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  • Long-elusive Mexican drug lord Ismael ‘El Mayo’ Zambada pleads guilty in US

    Former Mexican cartel kingpin Ismael “El Mayo” Zambada pleaded guilty Monday to U.S. drug trafficking charges, saying he was sorry for helping to flood the U.S. with cocaine, heroin and other illicit substances and for fueling deadly violence in Mexico.“I recognize the great harm illegal drugs have done to the people of the United States, of Mexico, and elsewhere,” he said through a Spanish-language interpreter. “I take responsibility for my role in all of it and I apologize to everyone who has suffered or been affected by my actions.”Under the leadership of Zambada and Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán, the Sinaloa cartel evolved from a regional player into the largest drug trafficking organization in the world, prosecutors say.“Culpable,” Zambada said, using the Spanish word for “guilty,” as he entered his plea.He acknowledged the extent of the Sinaloa operation, including underlings who built relationships with cocaine producers in Colombia, oversaw the importation of cocaine to Mexico by boat and plane and the smuggling of the drug across the U.S.-Mexico border. He acknowledged that people working for him paid bribes to Mexican police and military commanders “so they could operate freely,” going all the way back to when the cartel was just starting out.Zambada was arrested in Texas last year. He entered his plea two weeks after prosecutors said they wouldn’t seek the death penalty against him, a development that his attorney has called an important step in resolving the case.The lawyer, Frank Perez, said outside court Monday that “the outcome was good,” adding that Zambada “wanted to accept responsibility, and he did.”Zambada, 77, is due to be sentenced Jan. 13 to life in prison.He traced his involvement in the illegal drug business to his teenage years, when — after leaving school with a sixth-grade education — he planted marijuana for the first time in 1969. He said he went on to sell heroin and other drugs, but especially cocaine. From 1980 until last year, he and his cartel were responsible for transporting at least 1.5 million kilograms of cocaine, “most of which went to the United States,” he said.Prosecutors said in his indictment that he and the cartel also trafficked in fentanyl and methamphetamine.Considered a good negotiator, Zambada was seen as the cartel’s strategist and dealmaker who was more involved in its day-to-day doings than the more flamboyant Guzmán. Nevertheless, prosecutors have said Zambada also was enmeshed in the group’s violence, at one point ordering the murder of his own nephew.Zambada pleaded guilty to charges of engaging in a continuing criminal enterprise between 1989 and 2024 and racketeering conspiracy, which encompasses involvement in a number of crimes from 2000 to 2012.Prosecutors say he presided over a violent, highly militarized cartel with a private security force armed with powerful weapons and a cadre of “sicarios,” or hitmen, that carried out assassinations, kidnappings and torture. He acknowledged in his plea that he “directed people under my control to kill others” to serve the cartel’s interests.“Many innocent people were also killed,” he said in an eight-minute address to the court Monday.Zambada appeared momentarily unsteady as he arrived in a Brooklyn federal courtroom; a marshal grabbed his arm to direct him to his seat among his attorneys at the defense table.As Judge Brian M. Cogan described the charges in Zambada’s plea agreement, the bearded ex-Sinaloa boss sat attentively, at times brushing his right hand through his white hair.Guzmán was sentenced to life behind bars following his conviction in the same federal court in Brooklyn in 2019.The Sinaloa cartel is Mexico’s oldest criminal group, with various incarnations dating to the 1970s. It is a drug trafficking power player: A former Mexican cabinet member was convicted of taking bribes to help the cartel.U.S. law enforcement sought Zambada for more than two decades, but he was never arrested in any country until he arrived in Texas last year on a private plane with one of Guzmán’s sons, Joaquín Guzmán López. Guzmán López has pleaded not guilty to federal drug trafficking charges in Chicago; his brother, Ovidio Guzmán López, pleaded guilty last month.Zambada has said he was kidnapped in Mexico and taken against his will to the U.S.Zambada’s arrest touched off deadly fighting in Mexico between rival Sinaloa cartel factions, apparently pitting his loyalists against backers of Guzmán’s sons, dubbed the Chapitos — a term that translates to “little Chapos.”Associated Press writer Jennifer Peltz contributed.

    Former Mexican cartel kingpin Ismael “El Mayo” Zambada pleaded guilty Monday to U.S. drug trafficking charges, saying he was sorry for helping to flood the U.S. with cocaine, heroin and other illicit substances and for fueling deadly violence in Mexico.

    “I recognize the great harm illegal drugs have done to the people of the United States, of Mexico, and elsewhere,” he said through a Spanish-language interpreter. “I take responsibility for my role in all of it and I apologize to everyone who has suffered or been affected by my actions.”

    Under the leadership of Zambada and Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán, the Sinaloa cartel evolved from a regional player into the largest drug trafficking organization in the world, prosecutors say.

    “Culpable,” Zambada said, using the Spanish word for “guilty,” as he entered his plea.

    He acknowledged the extent of the Sinaloa operation, including underlings who built relationships with cocaine producers in Colombia, oversaw the importation of cocaine to Mexico by boat and plane and the smuggling of the drug across the U.S.-Mexico border. He acknowledged that people working for him paid bribes to Mexican police and military commanders “so they could operate freely,” going all the way back to when the cartel was just starting out.

    Zambada was arrested in Texas last year. He entered his plea two weeks after prosecutors said they wouldn’t seek the death penalty against him, a development that his attorney has called an important step in resolving the case.

    The lawyer, Frank Perez, said outside court Monday that “the outcome was good,” adding that Zambada “wanted to accept responsibility, and he did.”

    Zambada, 77, is due to be sentenced Jan. 13 to life in prison.

    He traced his involvement in the illegal drug business to his teenage years, when — after leaving school with a sixth-grade education — he planted marijuana for the first time in 1969. He said he went on to sell heroin and other drugs, but especially cocaine. From 1980 until last year, he and his cartel were responsible for transporting at least 1.5 million kilograms of cocaine, “most of which went to the United States,” he said.

    Prosecutors said in his indictment that he and the cartel also trafficked in fentanyl and methamphetamine.

    Considered a good negotiator, Zambada was seen as the cartel’s strategist and dealmaker who was more involved in its day-to-day doings than the more flamboyant Guzmán. Nevertheless, prosecutors have said Zambada also was enmeshed in the group’s violence, at one point ordering the murder of his own nephew.

    Zambada pleaded guilty to charges of engaging in a continuing criminal enterprise between 1989 and 2024 and racketeering conspiracy, which encompasses involvement in a number of crimes from 2000 to 2012.

    Prosecutors say he presided over a violent, highly militarized cartel with a private security force armed with powerful weapons and a cadre of “sicarios,” or hitmen, that carried out assassinations, kidnappings and torture. He acknowledged in his plea that he “directed people under my control to kill others” to serve the cartel’s interests.

    “Many innocent people were also killed,” he said in an eight-minute address to the court Monday.

    Zambada appeared momentarily unsteady as he arrived in a Brooklyn federal courtroom; a marshal grabbed his arm to direct him to his seat among his attorneys at the defense table.

    As Judge Brian M. Cogan described the charges in Zambada’s plea agreement, the bearded ex-Sinaloa boss sat attentively, at times brushing his right hand through his white hair.

    Guzmán was sentenced to life behind bars following his conviction in the same federal court in Brooklyn in 2019.

    The Sinaloa cartel is Mexico’s oldest criminal group, with various incarnations dating to the 1970s. It is a drug trafficking power player: A former Mexican cabinet member was convicted of taking bribes to help the cartel.

    U.S. law enforcement sought Zambada for more than two decades, but he was never arrested in any country until he arrived in Texas last year on a private plane with one of Guzmán’s sons, Joaquín Guzmán López. Guzmán López has pleaded not guilty to federal drug trafficking charges in Chicago; his brother, Ovidio Guzmán López, pleaded guilty last month.

    Zambada has said he was kidnapped in Mexico and taken against his will to the U.S.

    Zambada’s arrest touched off deadly fighting in Mexico between rival Sinaloa cartel factions, apparently pitting his loyalists against backers of Guzmán’s sons, dubbed the Chapitos — a term that translates to “little Chapos.”

    Associated Press writer Jennifer Peltz contributed.

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