Colombian drug lord arrested in Cuba
Colombia's police chief confirmed Friday that Luis H.
Gomez Bustamante, one of the most important drug lords of the
country's Norte del Valle Cartel, has been captured in Cuba.
"We have information from the Cuban authorities that this man
returned on July 2 to the island holding a Venezuelan passport and
he is arrested in Cuba for using a forged document," said Director
of the National Police of Colombia, General Jorge Daniel Castro.
He indicated that at present their contacts with the Colombian
embassy in Cuba are underway to see how the drug lord will be
brought back to Colombia.
The Norte del Valle cartel supplanted the cartels of the Cali and
Medellin in the early 1990s and is the source of up to 60 percent of
the US cocaine supply, according to the US Drug Enforcement
Administration (DEA).
In May 2003, the DEA accused nine members of this cartel for
shipping 10 billion US dollars' worth of cocaine to the United
States over the past years.
Colombia is the world's top cocaine and heroin producer, with an
annual output of 580 tons of heroin. It supplies about 80 percent of
the world's cocaine market, most of which ends up in the United
States and Europe.
Bus
accident kills 20 in Peru
Two buses collided with each other on Friday in dense fog on a
highway in southern Peru, leaving 20 dead and 25 injured.
A dense fog in the region and high speed contributed to the tragedy,
which took place on South Panamerican Highway near the coastal city
of Nasca, local media reported.
Police and rescue brigades rushed to the scene while the injured
were taken to the hospitals.
|
