Drug lord

Ecuador on Monday announced the arrest of a wanted cocaine trafficker from neighboring Colombia, as President Daniel Noboa said his government's crackdown on gang violence was starting to bear fruit.

Carlos Arturo Landazuri Cortes, a "high-value target," was captured overnight after months of investigations and intelligence work, Ecuador's police chief Cesar Augusto Zapata said on X.

Police in violence-plagued Ecuador arrested 68 people Sunday who had attempted to take over a hospital in the country's southwest in the midst of a "war" between drug gangs and the security forces.

In a harrowing turn of events, Ecuador finds itself in the throes of a declared "state of war" with drug cartels, marking the third consecutive day of a brutal campaign initiated by the criminal organizations. This violent response comes in the wake of a government crackdown on their illegal activities, as reported by AFP.

Turkish police has apprehended Isaac Bignan, known as the "Black Mamba," who is the right-hand man of Dutch drug baron Joseph Johannes Leijdekkers and wanted by Interpol with a red notice, as he was attempting to flee from the northwestern province of Muğla.

Infamous drug lord Rafael Caro Quintero, who was behind the killing of a U.S. DEA agent in 1985, was captured on July 15 by Mexican forces nearly a decade after walking out of a Mexican prison and returning to drug trafficking, Mexico's navy said.

The newspaper "Semana" states that Otoniel, in order to form a network for illegal trade, established connections in Panama, Mexico, the Dominican Republic and Belgium.

Anti-narcotics teams in the capital Ankara have unveiled cocaine traffic between a Colombian drug cartel, Cali, and seven Turkish drug barons in a nine-month surveillance, according to a report by the daily Hürriyet.

"Cali cartel sent the drugs in boxes of flowers, bananas, coffee or strawberries, using air and sea routes," the report said on Oct. 3.

Dutch police said on Jan. 23 they had arrested the alleged leader of a sprawling Asian drug syndicate who is listed as one of the world's most-wanted fugitives and has been compared to Mexican drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman.

It was a fine day for Albanian's embattled police - whose image was badly tarnished reports of close connections between senior police officers and drug-lords last year.

An investigation that lasted about two weeks ended on Wednesday with police seizing a record quantity of Colombian cocaine.

Turkish Deputy Prime Minister Recep Akdağ joked that he watched the popular TV series “Narcos,” which portrays the life of Columbian drug lord Pablo Escobar, to gain knowledge on the fight against drugs, as he commented on Turkey’s anti-narcotic efforts.