Illustrative image, source: Wellphotos | Dreamstime.com
Cuban authorities have arrested Zhi Dong Zhang, a Chinese fentanyl trafficker who escaped from custody in Mexico in July and is also wanted by the US, Mexican security sources told AFP on Wednesday.
The trafficker is known as “Brother Wang” and is suspected of having ties to Mexico's Sinaloa and Jalisco Nueva Generacion drug cartels. AFP sources said he will remain in Cuba pending a decision on possible extradition.
Zhang escaped from house arrest in Mexico before being extradited to the US, where US authorities issued an arrest warrant for him on money laundering charges.
Zhi Dong Zhang is considered “a major international money-laundering operator” responsible for “establishing connections with other cartels to transfer fentanyl from China to Central America, South America, Europe and the United States,” Mexican Security Secretary Omar Garcia Harfuch said last year.
Fentanyl, a major cause of overdoses in the US
After Donald Trump returned to the White House, Washington put pressure on Mexico and China to combat drug trafficking, especially fentanyl, a synthetic painkiller that has led to numerous overdoses in the US.
Fentanyl is a synthetic opioid 50 times stronger than heroin and much easier and cheaper to produce.
Fentanyl has largely replaced heroin and prescription opioids such as oxycodone in the cause of overdoses in the US.
Although Mexico has been the main source of fentanyl sold in the US, Washington has increasingly focused its attention on suppliers of precursor ingredients in China.
Authorities in the communist country of Cuba have not yet made any official comment on Zhi Dong Zhang's arrest.
PHOTO: Wellphotos | Dreamstime.com
