Angel Esteban Aguilar is suspected of masterminding the 2023 assassination of an Ecuadorian presidential candidate.
Legislation enforcement authorities have introduced that the chief of the Ecuadorean crime group Los Lobos was arrested on the worldwide airport in Mexico Metropolis, the place he tried to enter the nation beneath a false id.
The hassle on Wednesday to apprehend Angel Esteban Aguilar, referred to as “Lobo Menor”, was described as a collaborative effort from Colombia, Mexico and Ecuador.
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“This end result represents a big blow in opposition to transnational organised crime and confirms the effectiveness of trilateral cooperation,” Colombian President Gustavo Petro stated in a social media post.
Petro described Aguilar as “one of many world’s most infamous assassins” and confirmed that he had been extradited to Colombia to face fees.
Ecuadorean Inside Minister John Reimberg additionally hailed Aguilar’s arrest as successful.
On social media, he defined that Ecuador’s nationwide intelligence department and its nationwide police participated within the arrest alongside their counterparts in Mexico and Colombia. His message supplied a warning to cartel leaders.
“Regardless of the place they disguise, we are going to discover them, and we are going to catch them,” Reimberg wrote.
Ecuadorean authorities had sought Aguilar in reference to the 2023 assassination of anticorruption candidate Fernando Villavicencio, who was working for president on the time.
Aguilar has been described because the “mastermind” behind Villavicencio’s deadly capturing, which passed off because the candidate left a marketing campaign rally close to the Ecuadorian capital Quito.
In Colombia, Aguilar has additionally confronted accusations of collaborating with the alleged drug-trafficker Ivan Mordisco, the chief of the insurgent group Estado Mayor Central (EMC). He had been the topic of an ongoing manhunt within the nation.
The announcement comes amid stress from United States President Donald Trump, who has demanded that leaders throughout Latin America take a extra aggressive strategy in the direction of crime and drug trafficking.
The US president has threatened navy strikes on Colombia and Mexico, accusing their left-wing governments of permitting cartels to function unimpeded.
Colombia and Mexico, nevertheless, have rejected such allegations and have as an alternative highlighted their information of drug seizures and arrests.
Colombian President Gustavo Petro, as an example, has touted a drug bust final November that resulted within the confiscation of $388m value of cocaine, a historic quantity.
In the meantime, in Mexico, President Claudia Sheinbaum has taken motion in opposition to high-profile felony figures.
Final month, her authorities launched a navy operation in opposition to the chief of the Jalisco New Era Cartel, Nemesio Oseguera Cervantes, referred to as “El Mencho”, leading to his dying.
In saying Wednesday’s arrest, Mexican Safety Minister Omar Garcia Harfuch accused Aguilar of being “linked to drug trafficking, extortion and murder actions”
“This motion displays our nations’ shared dedication to combating transnational organized crime,” Harfuch stated in a statement.
The collaborative effort contrasts with latest disputes between Petro’s authorities and Ecuador’s right-wing President Daniel Noboa.
Beginning on March 1, Noboa positioned heavy tariffs on Colombian goods as penalty for what he stated was a lax strategy to drug enforcement.
Earlier this week, Petro accused Ecuador of finishing up strikes round Colombian territory, with 27 charred bodies discovered close to the international locations’ shared border.
The Trump administration, in the meantime, has publicly weighed launching its personal navy strikes on Colombia and Mexico, incomes rebukes from native politicians who view such threats as a violation of their national sovereignty.
The Trump and Noboa lately agreed to take part in joint navy operations in Ecuador.
Critics, nevertheless, have warned that their hardline strategy to crime will not be efficient and will improve the probability of safety forces committing abuses.
