U.S. Maintains Network of Secret Reporters Within Mexican Cartels

The White House mistrusts the corruption of Mexican institutions.

When Eric Holder, the attorney general of the United States, revealed two weeks ago that there was an Iranian conspiracy to assassinate the Saudi ambassador in Washington, he assured that the arrest of Mansour Arbabsiar, the author of the plot, had been possible thanks to the contacts that he kept with some members of the Mexican cartel called Los Zetas. According to the proof that The New York Times has had access to, the connection between Mexico and Iran came to light because Washington has had undercover agents within the main criminal groups operating in Mexico for two years.

The Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) has managed to introduce some reporters within cartels such as Los Zetas, Sinaloa or the Gulf, which has allowed it to closely monitor their criminal operations. Moreover, the United States is maintaining this espionage operation and is not informing the Mexican government about it because in Washington they are worried about this: Will the Mexican moles be exposed because of institutional corruption?

Thus, the United States has spread its control over the Mexican criminal networks beyond its own borders. According to The New York Times, the information it has obtained and selectively shared with the Mexican authorities has allowed the latter to capture and kill about 20 drug lords in the last few months.

Some agents of the U.S. government have been managing to infiltrate into Mexican cartels for two years. The embassy of the United States in Mexico issued a press release in which Washington states that it is not taking part in direct actions against organized crime in Mexico. The American embassy emphasizes that its government shares the responsibility of promoting the resolution of those problems and it makes clear that the collaboration is being developed “in full respect to the Mexican laws and sovereignty.”

One of those undercover agents within Los Zetas was the man with whom the Iranian Arbabsiar got in touch with to plan an attack in Washington in order to assassinate Adel A. Al-Jubeir, the Saudi ambassador in the United States. Arbabsiar is now waiting to be brought to trial in New York. According to The New York Times, that reporter was arrested in the United States for drug trafficking. However, the Department of Justice dropped the charges because he was willing to collaborate with authorities.

Since the Mexican government started an offensive to weaken the drug cartels in 2006, at least 36,000 people have died, according to official figures published in June. The peace movement of the poet Javier Sicilia, whose son was murdered in March in Cuernavaca (situated less than 100 kilometers south of the capital of the country), increases that figure to 40,000 dead.

One of the main worries of the White House is that violence could spread across the vast border (1,969 kilometers long) that separates Mexico from the United States. Because of that, The U.S. has taken drastic measures that consist of infiltrating spies into cartels and flying drones to inspect border points.

Ninety-six percent of marijuana entering the United States, 80 percent of methamphetamines, 64 percent of cocaine and 58 percent of heroin, enters the country via Mexico. In 2010, there were 33,696 seizures of drug packages on the border between the countries, in the states of Texas, New Mexico, Arizona and California.

According to a recent report about drug trafficking issued by the United States Department of Justice, “in spite of the general drop in violence between 2009 and 2010, violent incidents against agents in the United States have increased last year, above all in regions on the Southwestern border; it was mainly in response to a rise in operations against drug trafficking.”

In February, Jaime J. Zapata, an American border patrol agent, was murdered by Los Zetas while he was traveling by car from Mexico City to Monterrey (in the north of the country). A group of armed men arrested him during an illegal patrol and they opened fire. Víctor Ávila, his companion, was wounded in the leg. The FBI took charge of the investigation.