Culiacan, Mexico, Jun 25 (EFE).- The public "should not allow itself to be tricked" by a video that shows a former bodyguard of Gov. Mario Lopez Valdez alleging that the politician has links to drug traffickers, the government of the Mexican state of Sinaloa said.
The video, which was posted on the Internet and was the subject of reports by Mexican media outlets, shows former bodyguard Frank Armenta, who was kidnapped on June 5 by unidentified individuals, talking about the governor.
The video also includes sound bites from supposed telephone conversations between officials and police commanders in the northwestern Mexican state.
The public should avoid being "tricked by those who from illegality" and the shadows "want to confuse the citizenry" with the 56-minute video, the Sinaloa state government said in a statement.
Unidentified individuals are "producing materials taken out of context to try to discredit the actions that this government ... has taken against the criminal organizations that today no longer enjoy impunity for their illegal acts," the state government said.
Authorities will conduct the investigations necessary based on the "edited content" of the video, Sinaloa Attorney General Marco Antonio Higuera said.
The video shows Armenta sitting and talking about the governor and his associates, who he accuses of protecting Sinaloa drug cartel leader Joaquin "El Chapo" (Shorty) Guzman.
The Sinaloa cartel, sometimes referred to by officials as the Pacific cartel, is the oldest drug cartel in Mexico and Guzman, considered extremely violent, is one of the most-wanted criminals in Mexico and the United States, where the Drug Enforcement Administration has offered a reward of $5 million for him.
Guzman, who was arrested in Guatemala in 1993 and pulled off a Hollywood-style jailbreak when he escaped from the Puente Grande maximum-security prison in the western state of Jalisco on Jan. 19, 2001, is considered the most powerful drug trafficker in the world.
The Sinaloa cartel, according to intelligence agencies, is a transnational business empire that operates in the United States, Western Europe, Eastern Europe, the Americas and Asia.
