In December 2020, dozens of aircraft—mainly Hawker 800 jets and Cirrus G3s—took to the skies to traffic tons of cocaine along a route that began in Venezuela, made stops in Belize or Guatemala, and entered Mexico via the Yucatán Peninsula. Once in Mexican territory, the cargo was distributed to be smuggled across to the United States.
That winter, agents from Mexico’s National Intelligence Center turned their attention to “El Chuy,” a pilot recruiter for the Sinaloa Cartel.
Intelligence reports indicate that the operation was routine. At the time, “El Chuy” was allegedly handling shipments valued at one million dollars and paying his pilots 450,000 pesos per trip.
However, by 2021, monitoring of these operations—most of which had been flagged by U.S. authorities—virtually disappeared.
A recent journalistic investigation has brought to light how powerful Mexican cartels, such as the Sinaloa Cartel, have extended their reach into Nicolás Maduro’s Venezuela.
This connection is not just an international intelligence rumor; it is a well-documented network involving drug trafficking routes, bribes, and official protection, directly affecting Hispanic communities across the continent.
From Mexico to the United States, passing through Venezuela, this network poses a threat to the safety and well-being of millions of Hispanics seeking a better life far from violence and corruption.
The presence of Mexican cartels in Venezuela is nothing new, but it has gained renewed relevance with recent accusations against Maduro by the U.S. Department of Justice. According to declassified documents and leaks such as the Guacamaya Leaks, the Sinaloa Cartel used the Venezuelan state of Zulia as an operational base to traffic cocaine originating from Colombia.
In 2020, for example, clandestine air routes were detected departing from Venezuela toward Mexico, passing through Guatemala or Belize.
According to various accusations in the U.S., in order for Mexican cartels to operate in Venezuela, they bribed and received support from high-ranking officials who form part of the drug trafficking system embedded in the Venezuelan government, commonly known as the Cartel of the Suns.
The Cartel of the Suns evolved from a passive facilitator into an active player, allying with Mexican cartels to dominate maritime and air routes.
In this context of hidden alliances between Mexican cartels like Sinaloa and the Venezuelan regime through the Cartel of the Suns, President Claudia Sheinbaum’s stance is particularly alarming.
By categorically rejecting any intervention by the United States in Mexico to combat drug trafficking, insisting on national sovereignty and ruling out joint military actions—as she has expressed in press conferences and communications with Donald Trump—Sheinbaum appears to prioritize an isolationism that ignores the transnational dimension of the threat, allowing cocaine routes from Venezuela to continue flowing into Mexico and the U.S. without any effective counterbalance.
Her implicit support for Nicolás Maduro, manifested in firm statements condemning U.S. intervention in Venezuela and in the defense of non-interference under the Estrada Doctrine, not only aligns Mexico with a regime accused of narcoterrorism by the U.S. Department of Justice, but also raises suspicions about possible cover-ups.
What is this reluctance to accept external help against the drug cartels hiding, while she defends an ally like Maduro whose downfall, according to accusations from U.S. congressmen, could expose complicities with organized crime that undermine security throughout the Hispanic region?
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