MEXICO CITY, Dec. 17 (UPI) -- The "boss of bosses" of drug trafficking was killed in a military assault, in what is being called a large success for Mexico's anti-drug efforts.
Arturo Beltran Leyva was among those killed Wednesday in a two-hour firefight in Cuernavaca, as town south of Mexico City. He led a gang that is believed to be responsible for tons of cocaine being moved into the United States and thousands of violent deaths in Mexico.
While recent years have been marked with horrific drug-related violence across Mexico, the last few weeks were especially violent near Cuernavaca, where the Beltran Leyva cartel was being blamed for beheadings and other fatal mutilations. The group was said to have been successful in buying information from public officials to warn drug traffickers of government actions against them.
But Wednesday, the Mexican federal government carried out an operation with more than 200 military personnel attacking Beltran Leyva. At least three other members of the cartel were killed in the fighting. Mexico said three members of its force were injured.
The killing of Beltran Leyva is the biggest coup for Mexican anti-drug efforts since 2002 when the head of a trafficking group in Tijuana was shot.
