Santo Domingo.- The violent Sinaloa Cartel stole the twin engine plane from La Isabela International Airport (AILI) at El Higuero to transport two of its members to South America and then take cocaine to Honduras or Haiti, and from there to Mexico, prior to its final destination, the United States.

Newspaper El Dia, quoting intelligence sources, reports that the Sinaloa Cartel operates a cell of drug traffickers in Dominican Republic, where it has also been linked to several execution style murders in the last few months.

The airplane –a Beechcraft turboprop- recovered in Venezuela yesterday was piloted by the Venezuelans Pedro Gerardo and Ramon de los Santos, who work for an important narcotics trafficker.

The ring of narcotics traffickers has managed to elude the authorities thus far although the military and civilian personnel who helped them steal the plane have been arrested. Several days ago the authorities learned of the plane’s whereabouts in Venezuela’s Apure State, on the border with Colombia, found hidden beneath some bushes.

Armed Forces minister Joaquin Virgilio Perez said the authorities are working to get the plane back, and hailed their effort to solve the case, noting that the investigation is ongoing. “The small plane is there, under custory of Venezuela’s National Antinarcotics Office and we're conducting the diplomatic efforts (required) in these cases,” Perez said in Las Americas International Airport, where he went to see president Leonel Fernandez off to Miami.