TAMPA, Fla. (Diya TV) — In a significant blow to international drug trafficking, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), in collaboration with interagency partners, has executed a major drug seizure targeting Mexican cartels and foreign terrorist organizations (FTOs). As part of the ongoing “Panama Express Strike Force” initiative, the operation resulted in the confiscation of over 13,000 kilograms of cocaine and other narcotics intended for distribution on American streets, with an estimated street value of hundreds of millions of dollars.
The Panama Express Strike Force, based in Tampa, Florida, is a longstanding Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Force (OCDETF) comprising agents and analysts from multiple federal agencies. The list includes the FBI, Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), Homeland Security Investigations (HSI), the U.S. Coast Guard Investigative Service, the Naval Criminal Investigative Service, and the U.S. Southern Command’s Joint Interagency Task Force South.
Founded to disrupt and dismantle transnational criminal organizations that engage in large-scale drug trafficking and related activities, the task force has a history of significant interdictions. In the last few years, the Panama Express Strike Force has been involved in many high-profile cases. One example is when a Colombian national was sentenced to over 17 years in federal prison for conspiring to distribute cocaine via semi-submersible vessels destined for the Sinaloa Cartel in Mexico in February 2024…