Federal police have arrested a man suspected of being one of Mexico’s leading smugglers of firearms, ammunition and explosives, the Public Safety Secretariat said Thursday.

In a statement, it said the authorities arrested 34-year-old Eduardo Avila Ojeda Wednesday in the northwestern city of Culiacan, capital of Sinaloa state, as part of an investigation launched after the Dec. 30 capture of another suspected arms trafficker, Ramiro Rendon Rivera.

Intelligence reports indicate that Avila and Rendon are firearms distributors for the Sinaloa drug cartel and several previous investigations by federal organized crime prosecutors have linked them to that activity.