( AFP).- An eerie silence pervades the historic center of Culiacan, the capital of the Mexican state of Sinaloa, where infighting among one of the world’s biggest drug cartels has left hundreds of people dead since September.
As night falls on Paseo del Angel, the city’s entertainment quarter, a popular restaurant offering Japanese-Mexican fusion cuisine that was booked out nightly just a few months ago is virtually empty.
A nail salon and a pastry shop on the same street have “for sale” signs in the window.
“Life in Culiacan has almost disappeared,” Miguel Taniyama, owner of the Clan Taniyama restaurant, lamented.
Years of relative quiet in Sinaloa, a predominantly agricultural state home to the notorious cartel of the same name, were shattered in September when two rival factions of the drug gang went to war.
– Allegations of double-crossing –
Since then, each week has brought a grim litany of shootouts, abductions, bodies dumped in the street, and vehicles and businesses set alight, sending Culiacan’s 800,000 residents scrambling for cover.
The bloodletting began on September 9 after details emerged of how the son of the cartel’s jailed founder Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman reportedly double-crossed the cartel’s other co-founder, Ismael “El Mayo” Zambada.
Zambada was arrested on US soil on July 25 after allegedly being kidnapped in Mexico and delivered to US authorities against his will.
CLICK HERE TO READ THE FULL ARTICLE BY Marcos VIZCARRA and Alexander MARTINEZ ON AFP
San Miguel Times
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