{"id":21890,"date":"2026-04-28T21:12:10","date_gmt":"2026-04-28T21:12:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/news\/21890\/"},"modified":"2026-04-28T21:12:10","modified_gmt":"2026-04-28T21:12:10","slug":"mexico-says-4-foreigners-were-at-cartel-raid-where-2-c-i-a-officers-died","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/news\/21890\/","title":{"rendered":"Mexico Says 4 Foreigners Were at Cartel Raid Where 2 C.I.A. Officers Died"},"content":{"rendered":"

Four foreigners \u2014 not two \u2014 were on the ground during a counter-cartel operation last week in northern Mexico, where an automobile crash killed two men that were later confirmed<\/a> to be Central Intelligence Agency officers, a Mexican state prosecutor said on Monday.<\/p>\n

The two C.I.A. officers, along with two Mexican officials, died on April 19 when their vehicle plunged off a remote mountain road in the northern state of Chihuahua as they returned from an operation led by Mexico\u2019s armed forces to dismantle a large clandestine methamphetamine lab. The state authorities had initially said only two foreigners were part of the operation.<\/p>\n

The episode set off a tense standoff between President Claudia Sheinbaum of Mexico and the government of Chihuahua state, where she has directed much of her frustration. She has repeatedly said her security cabinet had no knowledge of C.I.A. activities on the ground in the state and warned they may have been illegal, launching a federal investigation into the matter.<\/p>\n

She has also demanded information from the United States to clarify the role of the two C.I.A. agents in the operation to determine whether it violated Mexico\u2019s security laws, which bar foreign agents from operating in the country without prior federal authorization.<\/p>\n

Speaking to reporters on Monday evening, Wendy Paola Ch\u00e1vez, the Chihuahua special prosecutor, said there were in fact four foreigners at the scene, not just the two C.I.A. officers, though she did not confirm whether the two additional officers were Americans or whether they were members of the C.I.A.<\/p>\n

She said the four foreigners were dressed as civilians with their faces mostly covered, and they carried no weapons or identification. They were working directly with the head of the state investigative agency, she said, and that their participation was limited, \u201cwith no direct operational interaction,\u201d except with the agency\u2019s director, who was also killed in the crash. She also said that the two unidentified agents, along with Mexican officers, tried to rescue the car crash victims.<\/p>\n

Their presence was not reported to higher-ranking military officials, Ms. Ch\u00e1vez said, and the agency\u2019s director did not inform his superiors that the four foreign officers would be involved.<\/p>\n

The prosecutor\u2019s office has asked the U.S. Embassy, which claimed the two bodies, for information about the identities and roles of the other two foreigners.<\/p>\n

Over the weekend, the Mexican government said<\/a> that the two C.I.A. officers killed in the crash had no formal authorization to carry out operations in the country. One of the two officials entered the country as a visitor \u2014 \u201cwithout permission to engage in paid work\u201d \u2014 and the other arrived on a diplomatic passport, the Mexican federal security cabinet said in a statement.<\/p>\n

Amid the fallout, the Chihuahua state attorney general, C\u00e9sar J\u00e1uregui Moreno, resigned Monday, citing \u201comissions\u201d and \u201cinconsistencies\u201d from his staff that he said failed to inform him that U.S. personnel were present during the drug raid operation that led to the seizure of six drug laboratories.<\/p>\n

His resignation followed a week of shifting and contradictory accounts from his office about the Americans\u2019 role in the operation. State officials initially said<\/a> the men were killed while returning \u201cfrom an operation to dismantle clandestine laboratories.\u201d State officials later said they were part of an authorized training program to teach Mexican counterparts how to handle dangerous synthetic drugs.<\/p>\n

Mr. J\u00e1uregui subsequently said U.S. personnel had not taken part in the operation itself, which he described as led by Mexican forces, adding that the American \u201cinstructors\u201d arrived afterward for training purposes, \u201csuch as teaching the handling of drones.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ms. Sheinbaum said Tuesday that the investigation into the presence of C.I.A. agents in the counterdrug operation should continue following the attorney general\u2019s resignation.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe investigation must continue, it doesn\u2019t stop with a resignation,\u201d she said during a news conference. The federal attorney general\u2019s office is also investigating the case, Ms. Sheinbaum said.<\/p>\n

Her comments come at a tense moment in U.S.-Mexico relations as President Trump has mounted pressure on Mexico to do more against drug cartels, at times saying he would launch U.S. military actions against cartels on Mexican territory \u2014 a proposal Ms. Sheinbaum has repeatedly rejected. Driven in part by Mr. Trump\u2019s pressure, she has carried out a sweeping crackdown<\/a> on cartel groups.<\/p>\n

Ms. Sheinbaum said Tuesday the Trump administration was providing information about the presence of C.I.A. officers in Chihuahua following a diplomatic note sent by Mexico last week, adding that U.S. officials had responded that \u201cthey clearly state that they want to respect the law and the Constitution of Mexico.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ms. Sheinbaum said she did not plan to expel additional U.S. agents after the incident, but added that she had told the U.S. government \u201cthat Mexico must be respected.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Four foreigners \u2014 not two \u2014 were on the ground during a counter-cartel operation last week in northern…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":21891,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[10891,12809,11330,6238,8,215,9,2712,7,1071],"class_list":{"0":"post-21890","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-top-stories","8":"tag-central-intelligence-agency","9":"tag-chihuahua-mexico","10":"tag-claudia","11":"tag-donald-j","12":"tag-headlines","13":"tag-mexico","14":"tag-news","15":"tag-sheinbaum","16":"tag-top-stories","17":"tag-trump"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@news\/116484396976077094","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21890","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21890"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21890\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/21891"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21890"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21890"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21890"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}