Argentina arrests Colombian drug kingpin

1 of Colombia's most notorious drug kingpins has been arrested in a suburb of Buenos Aires and could be extradited to the United States, Argentina authorities said Wednesday. Henry de Jesus Lopez Londono, a leader of the Los Urabenos cartel, was taken into custody on an international arrest warrant late Tuesday at a restaurant in the town of Pilar, some 50 kilometers north of Buenos Aires, where he was dining with his bodyguards, said a police source who requested anonymity. Lopez Londono "is subject to a US capture order. One of the possibilities is his extradition to the United States," Sergio Berni, Argentina's deputy security minister, said at a news conference. He was to appear later Wednesday before a federal judge in the Argentine capital. The head of Bogota's national police force, Jose Roberto Leon, told Caracol radio that Lopez Londono was wanted by Colombia on various charges including terrorism and drug trafficking. He said an arrest warrant on drug trafficking charges had also been issued by a Florida court for Lopez Londono, who went by the nickname "Mi Sangre." The Colombian police chief added that the arrest was the result of an operation headed by President Juan Manuel Santo, in consultation with Argentine President Cristina Kirchner. Londono's group, Los Urabenos, a powerful former paramilitary group, was named after the Uraba section of Antioquia in western Colombia, the group's stronghold. In recent years, several Colombian drug traffickers have been arrested in Argentina, considered a country where narcotics are both consumed and transited through. In 2011, Argentine authorities seized more than six tonnes of cocaine -- a record - and 92 tonnes of marijuana.