Valdez, who got his improbable nickname from his fair complexion and blue eyes, is wanted in the United States for allegedly smuggling tons of cocaine and inside Mexico is blamed for a brutal turf war that has included bodies hung from bridges, decapitations and shootouts as he and a rival fought for control of the divided Beltran Leyva cartel.
Calderon called Valdez “one of the most-wanted criminals in Mexico and abroad” in a Tweet. He vowed that operations to bring down the rest of his gang will continue following his arrest Tuesday in Mexico State, an area that borders Mexico City.
The arrest was the culmination of a yearlong intelligence operation, the Public Safety Department said in a statement.
The statement offered no other details, but included a photograph of Valdez sporting stubble as he kneels on the ground, a police officer's hand on his shoulder.
Valdez was charged in May in US District Court in Atlanta with distributing thousands of pounds of cocaine from Mexico to the eastern US from 2004 to 2006.
US authorities had offered a reward of up to $2 million for information leading to his capture, and the Mexican government offered a similar amount.
Mexican authorities say Valdez has been battling for control of the Beltran Leyva cartel since its leader, Arturo Beltran Leyva, was killed in a December shootout with marines in Cuernavaca, a favorite weekend getaway south of the Mexican capital.
The fight against Hector Beltran Leyva — a brother of Arturo — has made a battleground of what was once a relatively peaceful pocket of the country and brought the drug war ever closer to Mexico City. Their fight has spread westward toward the resort city of Acapulco.
The US State Department says Valdez headed a group of assassins for the Beltran Leyva gang. He “is the person most responsible for pushing the battle into central and southern Mexico,” the department says on its website.
