News of new arrests rocked even jaded Mexico crime watchers who expect corruption at every level: five officials of the Attorney General’s Organized Crime unit admitted they accepted hundreds of thousands of dollars each month for reporting the government’s planned operations to the Beltran-Leyva Cartel. This cartel is associated with the Sinoloa cartel, Mexico’s largest drug-trafficking organization.
Two top employees of the crime unit, one an assistant intelligence director, and at least three federal police agents assigned to it passed information on surveillance targets and potential raids for at least four years.
Investigation at the Attorney General’s office has been ongoing for several months and has resulted in 35 officials being fired or arrested since July 31.
In a separate case of infiltration, a man who worked for Interpol at the Mexico City airport reportedly spied on the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) from within the US embassy. He too passed sensitive information to the Leyva Cartel, he confessed to US authorities.
"This doesn’t say much for US security – it’s as embarrassing as hell for this to come out and I suspect heads will roll within the DEA," said Bruce Bagley, an expert in Latin American drug trafficking, from the University of Miami in Florida.
Although the Mexican government has recently made several significant arrests, the infiltration of Attorney General’s office is a blow to President Felipe Calderon’s war on organized crime as it demonstrates the reach of the criminal organizations into the very core of the Mexican government.