The arrest of the head of the Sinaloa drug cartel, Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán, will not affect drug trafficking in Mexico, but it presents an opportunity to change the country’s drug policy, experts told IPS.
Earlier this month, Reuters revealed that a special division within the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) has been using intelligence intercepts, wiretaps, informants and a mass database of telephone records to secretly identify targets for drug enforcement actions.
The controversial topic of medical cannabis has been put under a microscope after the internationally known neurosurgeon Dr. Sanjay Gupta came out in support of its use this week.
The U.S. Central Intelligence Agency and other international security forces "don't fight drug traffickers", a spokesman for the Chihuahua state government in northern Mexico has told Al Jazeera, instead "they try to manage the drug trade".