Zhi Dong Zhang, Chinese boss of the drug who is wanted by the United States justice system, is currently detained in Cuba, according to international press reports.
Accused of moving thousands of kilos of drugs—mainly fentanyl and cocaine—and laundering millions of dollars through a criminal organization, Zhi Dong escaped this summer from Mexico, where he had been imprisoned and was awaiting extradition to US territory.
Mexican official sources assured the Spanish newspaper The Country that the drug trafficker is in Cuba, after his entry into Russia was rejected. Known by the alias of Brother Wangthe criminal would have entered the island with a false passport.
“Mexico is waiting for the Cuban authorities to conclude their interrogation to receive him and, automatically, according to the same sources, extradite him to the United States,” says the media, which does not provide details about the capo’s detention in Cuba nor a time horizon regarding his presumed return to Mexico.
So far, Cuban authorities have not confirmed Zhi Dong’s alleged detention on the island, nor have they made reference to his exchange on the matter with his Mexican counterparts.
The story of Zhi Dong Zhang, alias ‘Brother Wang’, is more like that of a double agent than that of a Chinese kingpin. He was detained in Mexico City and is a priority target for the United States, but he escaped. According to some sources, it is located in Cuba
https://t.co/uuzhTfp3JN— EL PAÍS (@el_pais) October 21, 2025
US “priority objective”
Also known as El Chino, Tocayo, Pancho and Nelson Mandela, Zhi Dong used different identities and false passports to move around the world without raising suspicion, reveals El País, according to which due to his criminal activity he is a “priority target” for the United States.
The anti-drug agency and the US justice system accuse him of directing, since at least 2016, a drug trafficking network that works with Mexican drug cartels and has tentacles in America as well as in Europe and Asia. Its base, however, is in the North American cities of Los Angeles and Atlanta.
After being arrested in Mexico last year, he was sent to a maximum security prison in that country, but surprisingly a judge granted him house arrest, a measure that was harshly criticized by President Claudia Sheinbaum.
Already under these circumstances, and despite being in military custody, the fentanyl kingpin made a notorious escape in July to leave Mexico in his attempt to avoid his extradition to the United States. This is how he would end up in Cuba after “an adventure through several countries,” according to the Spanish newspaper.
His escape, moreover, took place just six days after a federal court in Georgia had issued new charges against him, based on the revelations of one of his collaborators. In particular, he is accused of laundering at least $20 million between 2020 and 2021, through more than a hundred shell companies and bank accounts.
Although ties between Washington and Havana are at their lowest point in years since Donald Trump’s return to the White House – added to the growing tensions in the region due to the current US anti-drug military deployment in the Caribbean – the island could now be the key to the arrival of the wanted drug trafficker to the United States.
However, Zhi Dong’s path to American justice would apparently pass through Mexico, a country with which Cuba currently maintains close relations, but from where the criminal has already managed to escape once.
