Mexican President Claudia Scheinbaum has sent her chief of security, Omar García Harfuch, to the state of Sinaloa to end the violence.
A spate of murders and disappearances in Sinaloa overshadowed Sheinbaum’s first months in office.
She was sworn in as Mexico’s first female head of state on Oct. 1 after a campaign in which she pledged to follow her predecessor’s approach of avoiding direct confrontations with the cartels.
“There will be no return to an irresponsible war on drugs,” she said in her inaugural address, ruling out a more militaristic approach.
But facing mounting criticism at home and pressure from U.S. President-elect Donald Trump, who wants Mexico to do more to end the U.S. trade in the synthetic opioid fentanyl, Scheinbaum on Wednesday appeared to set her sights on fighting the violence in Sinaloa. priority.
At a news conference, she said her administration would adopt a “zero tolerance” approach.
She also praised security forces for making Mexico’s largest fentanyl seizure to date.
“This is an investigation that has been going on for a long time and yesterday it produced these results. This is the largest seizure of fentanyl pills in history,” she said.
Mexico’s security chief, Omar Garcia Harfuch, earlier announced on X, formerly known as Twitter, that the fentanyl pills seized at two sites in Sinaloa were worth $394m (£309m) and weighed more than a tonne.
“These actions will continue until the violence in the state of Sinaloa is reduced,” he said in the post (in Spanish)., external
The news of the massive fentanyl ban comes just over a week after Trump threatened to impose 25% tariffs on goods from Mexico and Canada on the first day of his presidency.
He said the tariffs would remain in place “until drugs, specifically fentanyl, and all illegal aliens stop this invasion of our country.”
Mexican officials also announced Wednesday that they had detained more than 5,200 migrants across the country the day before, in response to President Sheinbaum’s pledge to Trump to stop a caravan of migrants heading north through Mexico from reaching the US border.
