{"id":201302,"date":"2026-02-23T05:13:14","date_gmt":"2026-02-23T05:13:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/violence-erupts-in-mexico-after-killing-of-drug-cartel-kingpin-el-mencho-al-jazeera\/"},"modified":"2026-02-23T05:13:14","modified_gmt":"2026-02-23T05:13:14","slug":"violence-erupts-in-mexico-after-killing-of-drug-cartel-kingpin-el-mencho-al-jazeera","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/violence-erupts-in-mexico-after-killing-of-drug-cartel-kingpin-el-mencho-al-jazeera\/","title":{"rendered":"Violence erupts in Mexico after killing of drug cartel kingpin \u2018El Mencho\u2019 – Al Jazeera"},"content":{"rendered":"

Nemesio Ruben Oseguera Cervantes\u2019s death sets off a wave of \u2060violence, with torched cars and gunmen blocking highways in more than half a dozen states.<\/em>
Burnt vehicles line highway near Mexican World Cup stadium
Share
Save
Mexican security forces have killed a drug lord who led one of the most powerful criminal organisations in the country, triggering a wave of violence in several areas, including the western state of Jalisco.
The Mexican Secretariat of National Defence said Nemesio Ruben Oseguera Cervantes, also known as \u201cEl Mencho\u201d, was wounded in a clash with soldiers in the town of Tapalpa, in Jalisco state, on Sunday and died while being flown to Mexico City.
He had a $15m bounty on his head from the United States.
The Mexican operation set off a wave of \u2060violence, with gunmen torching cars and blocking highways in more than half a dozen states, including Jalisco, Colima, Michoacan, Nayarit, Guanajuato, and Tamaulipas.
Jalisco\u2019s capital, Guadalajara, which will host several matches in the upcoming FIFA World Cup<\/a>, was turned into a ghost town on Sunday night as civilians hunkered down.
Videos circulating on social media showed people sprinting through the Guadalajara airport in panic and smoke billowing over the tourist city of Puerto Vallarta.
Jalisco Governor Pablo Lemus told residents to stay home and suspended public transportation.
School was cancelled on Monday in several states.
Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum praised the country\u2019s security forces in a post on X and called for calm.
\u201cThere is absolute coordination with the governments of all states,\u201d she wrote. \u201cIn the vast majority of the national territory, activities are proceeding with complete normality.\u201d<\/p>\n

Oseguera, 59, is one of the biggest Mexican drug lords to be taken down since the capture of the founders of the Sinaloa cartel, Joaquin \u201cEl Chapo\u201d Guzman and Ismael Zambada, who are now both in US custody.
The Mexican Defence Secretariat said Sunday\u2019s raid was carried out with \u201ccomplementary information\u201d from US authorities. It said four members of Oseguera\u2019s Jalisco New Generation Cartel (CJNG) were killed in the raid, while two others died during their transfer to Mexico City.
Two more were arrested, and armoured vehicles, rocket launchers and other arms were seized, it said.\u00a0Three members of the armed forces were wounded and are receiving medical treatment, it added.
US Deputy Secretary of State Christopher Landau welcomed the operation and called Oseguera \u201cone of the bloodiest and most ruthless drug kingpins\u201d.
\u201cThis is a great development for Mexico, the US, Latin America, and the world,\u201d he added.
The US State Department warned Americans in the states of Jalisco, Tamaulipas, Michoacan, Guerrero and Nuevo Leon to remain in safe places due to the ongoing security operations.
Canada also issued a travel warning for some areas, citing \u201cshootouts with security forces and explosions\u201d in Jalisco, Guerrero and Michoacan. It warned its citizens in Puerto Vallarta to shelter in place and keep a low profile in Jalisco.
Air Canada announced it was suspending flights to Puerto Vallarta \u201cdue to an ongoing security situation\u201d and advised customers not to go to their airport.
United Airlines \u200cand American Airlines also said they have cancelled flights to Puerto Vallarta and Guadalajara.<\/p>\n

The military operation against Oseguera follows a pressure campaign from the administration of US President Donald Trump on Sheinbaum\u2019s government to ramp up its crackdown on drug trafficking, including threats to intervene directly in Mexico.
Oseguera, a former police officer and avocado farmer, co-founded the CJNG around 2007, and built it into what the FBI considers Mexico\u2019s most powerful trafficking organisation, responsible for the bulk of cocaine, heroin, methamphetamine and fentanyl entering the US.
He cultivated an air of mystery throughout the country, keeping such a low profile that all known photographs of him were decades old.
Al Jazeera\u2019s John Hollman, reporting from Mexico City, said Oseguera was \u201cthe undisputed head\u201d of the CJNG and \u201cthe most powerful Mexican drug trafficking figure that was free in the country\u201d.
He called the kingpin\u2019s killing a \u201ctriumph\u201d for Sheinbaum\u2019s government, but said it could unleash a wave of violence across Mexico.
\u201cThere is no obvious successor to Oseguera. His brother is in a US prison, and his son, called El Menchito, is also in prison. As is his daughter. We could now see different regional bosses in the cartel start disputing for power. We saw this happen before. When El Chapo was arrested, it eventually sparked a civil war between the different Sinaloa factions,\u201d Hollman said.
The timing is particularly sensitive, our correspondent noted, with Mexico set to host the FIFA World Cup and Guadalajara serving as a host city.
\u201cSo, what looks like a government triumph today could become a significantly bigger security crisis in the months ahead,\u201d he said.
Analysts said Mexico\u2019s military needed to move quickly to limit any violence.
\u201cKilling or capturing the head of the cartel is not really going to have a major impact. They have to go after the infrastructure, their logistics, the money laundering, their armed wings,\u201d said Mike Vigil, the former chief of international operations at the US Drug Enforcement Administration.
\u201cWhat they have to do is launch a frontal assault based on intelligence, and basically diminish the infrastructure of this cartel. And they have to do it quick and they have to do it efficiently, because if not, there is going to be hell to pay in terms of violence,\u201d he said.
Vigil said the Trump\u00a0administration has done little to address the US side of the equation, despite pressuring Mexico on drug trafficking.
Hundreds of thousands of weapons flow from the US into Mexico annually \u2013 a stark contrast to Mexico\u2019s single military-run gun store, which sells just 6,500 firearms a year \u2013 yet the Republican Party has shown no appetite for curbing those exports, he said.
Similarly, the administration has made no meaningful push to reduce domestic drug demand, he said.
\u201cIf there is no demand or consumption, there\u2019s not gonna be any cartels. It is a big problem,\u201d he said. \u201cBut the Trump administration does nothing in terms of drug education, treatment of drug addiction \u2013 none of that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Follow Al Jazeera English:<\/p>\n

source<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Nemesio Ruben Oseguera Cervantes\u2019s death sets off a wave of \u2060violence, with torched cars and gunmen blocking highways in more than half a dozen states.Burnt vehicles line highway near Mexican World Cup stadiumShareSaveMexican security forces have killed a drug lord who led one of the most powerful criminal organisations in the country, triggering a wave […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":201303,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-201302","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world","8":"entry"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/201302","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=201302"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/201302\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/201303"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=201302"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=201302"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=201302"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}