The State Department announced that it is implementing specific sanctions to disrupt a “sophisticated transnational criminal network fueling America’s illicit fentanyl crisis.” The network crosses India, Guatemala, and Mexico.
“By targeting the entire supply chain—from chemical suppliers in Asia to logistics brokers in Central America to cartel-affiliated networks in Mexico—the Trump Administration is disrupting networks that destabilize governance throughout our hemisphere while threatening American security,” the State Department said.
Addressing the Sinaloa Cartel, which receives supplies from the drug network, the Department said the cartel “poses an extraordinary threat not only to the United States, but to the stability and security of the entire region.”
The action aligns with President Trump’s order designating fentanyl as a weapon of mass destruction.
“Illicit fentanyl is closer to a chemical weapon than a narcotic. Two milligrams, an almost undetectable trace amount equivalent to 10 to 15 grains of table salt, constitutes a lethal dose. Hundreds of thousands of Americans have died from fentanyl overdoses,” the order says.
“The two cartels that are predominantly responsible for the distribution of fentanyl in the United States engage in armed conflict over territory and to protect their operations, resulting in large-scale violence and death that go beyond the immediate threat of fentanyl itself,” it adds. “Further, the potential for fentanyl to be weaponized for concentrated, large-scale terror attacks by organized adversaries is a serious threat to the United States.”
In February, the State Department’s Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs offered up to $10 million for information leading to the arrests of brothers leading the Sinaloa Cartel’s operations in Tijuana.
