Mexico’s most wanted drug lord arrested

Mexico's most wanted man, drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman, known as El Chapo or "Shorty", has been captured, 13 years after escaping from a high-security jail.

Guzman was captured early on Saturday morning in a hotel in Mazatlan, a resort city located on the Pacific coast state of Sinaloa and the heart of the drug lord's multinational and multibillion operations.

President Enrique Pena Nieto confirmed the arrest and praised the Mexican and US law enforcement officials.

Guzmán's Sinaloa cartel is the biggest trafficking organisation in Mexico, with a long tradition of moving South American cocaine to insatiable markets in US and other parts of the world, as well as locally produced marijuana, heroin and methamphetamines. The group has also appeared to come out on top in most of its regional turf wars with rival cartels in different parts of Mexico that are at the heart of the violence blamed for the death of many tens of thousands of people.

The arrest could prove to be the most significant single development yet in the drug wars that have battered Mexico since the launch of a crackdown on organised crime seven years ago.

Nearly 80,000 people have died in drug-related killings in Mexico since former President Felipe Calderon sent in the army in early 2007 to quell the powerful drug bosses, a policy Pena Nieto has criticised but found tough to break with.

The US had offered a $5m reward for information leading to the arrest of Guzman, who is accused of being behind much of the drug violence that has plagued Mexico for years.

In a statement released by the US Department of Justice (DOJ), Attorney General Eric Holder said that the apprehension of Joaquin Guzman is a landmark achievement, and a victory for the citizens of both Mexico and the United States.