| | |  News Around the Republic of Mexico | January 2009 
Mexico Says Gulf Cartel is Most Violent Gang
 Associated Press
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| | Alleged Gulf cartel leader Osiel Cardenas is moved during his extradition to the United States from Mexico January 2007 in this photo released by the Mexican Attorney General's Office. (Associated Press) | |
Mexico City – Mexican prosecutors said Thursday that the Gulf drug cartel and its Zeta hit men are the most violent of Mexico's gangs and account for the highest number of weapons seized.
The Attorney General's Office says the two related gangs have "the biggest presence and activity in crime and violence."
Together, they accounted for a majority of the 31,512 weapons seized by law enforcement officials since December 2005. Those arms include anti-tank weapons, grenade launchers and .50-caliber rifles.
The cartel, which recruited a gang of hit men known as Zetas from army deserters, controls cocaine and marijuana trafficking along Mexico's Gulf coast, and ships drugs to the United States.
The office said the second-highest number of arms was seized from the Tijuana-based Arellano Felix cartel. Mexico's largest drug trafficking organization, the Sinaloa cartel and its allies, was third in the number of weapons seized.
The cartels have been locked in increasingly bloody battles for control of trafficking routes that resulted in the deaths of over 5,300 people in Mexico in 2008. |
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