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Mexican naval officers stand guard after cutting open more than 20 shark carcasses filled with slabs of cocaine after checking a container ship in a container port in the southern Mexico state of Yucatan - Source: Reuters
Mexico's navy has seized more than a tonne of cocaine stuffed
inside frozen sharks, as drug gangs under military pressure go to
greater lengths to conceal narcotics bound for the United
States.
Armed and masked navy officers cut open more than 20 shark
carcasses filled with slabs of cocaine after checking a container
ship in a container port in the southern Mexico state of Yucatan,
the navy and Mexican media said.
"We are talking about more than a tonne of cocaine that was inside
the ship," Navy Commander Eduardo Villa told reporters after X-ray
machines and sniffer dogs helped uncover the drugs.
"Those in charge of the shipment said it was a conserving agent
but after checks we confirmed it was cocaine," he said.
Drug gangs are coming up with increasingly creative ways of getting
drugs into the United States - in sealed beer cans, religious
statues and furniture - as Mexico's military cracks down on the
cartels moving South American narcotics north.
President Felipe Calderon has sent 45,000 troops and federal police
across Mexico to try to crush powerful smuggling cartels.
But traffickers armed with a huge arsenal of grenades and
automatic weapons are far from defeated, worrying Washington as
violence spills over into US states like Arizona.
Some 2,750 people have died in drug violence in Mexico this year, a
pace similar to that of 2008, when 6,300 were killed.
Led by Mexico's most wanted man, Joaquin "Shorty" Guzman, smugglers
from the Pacific state of Sinaloa are fighting a turf war with
rivals.
Guzman seeks to control Mexican and Central American smuggling routes into the United States.
