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 Guzman, the infamous boss of the Sinaloa drug cartel and the
world's most prominent drug trafficker, was arrested in northwestern
Mexico on Friday after a months-long manhunt.
On Sunday, Interpol served two extradition warrants, the Mexican
attorney general's office said, kick-starting the latest attempt to
have Guzman face U.S. justice for the hundreds of tonnes of cocaine,
methamphetamine and heroin he has exported across the border.
Mexico regularly extradites leading traffickers but the government
of President Enrique Pena Nieto resisted handing over Guzman after
his Feb. 2014 arrest as a point of national pride.
That position changed after he escaped from a maximum security
prison in July - for the second time in his career - by slipping
away through a mile-long tunnel that surfaced in his cell.
 Guzman has been taken back to the same facility over the weekend
but, to avoid a repeat of that humiliation, Mexico's government says
it aims to hand Guzman over to U.S. justice as soon as possible. His
lawyers are trying to block extradition.
The U.S. government wants Guzman, who is believed to be 58 years
old, tried on charges ranging from money laundering to drug
trafficking, kidnapping and murder.
Guzman, who is blamed for thousands of deaths in Mexico and the
United States from addiction and gang warfare, is facing open
federal indictments in seven U.S. jurisdictions.
Chicago and Brooklyn, New York are leading contenders to host what
would be one of the most high profile U.S. criminal trials in years,
former U.S. law enforcement officials said.
Chicago, which in 2013 dubbed Guzman its first Public Enemy No.1
since Al Capone, has a sweeping 2009 indictment against him,
including several counts of conspiring to smuggle and distribute
drugs, as well as money laundering charges.
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"It will be a fight between each jurisdiction but logic would say
that Chicago is the way to go," said former U.S. Drug Enforcement
Administration agent Robert Mazur, who spent five years undercover
infiltrating the criminal hierarchy of Colombia's drug cartels and
is now president of a Florida private investigations agency.
Mexico could extradite Guzman by mid-year, sources familiar with the
situation said. However, the timing will likely depend on any
injunctions filed by Guzman´s lawyers, meaning that a U.S. trial
could still be a year or more away.
Mexican government sources say security forces were helped in their
efforts to recapture Guzman when he met with Hollywood star Sean
Penn late last year. They said they were aware of the planned
meeting so kept track of Penn, allowing them to locate Guzman.
Neither Penn nor Mexican actress Kate Del Castillo, who set up the
meeting, have commented since their interview with Guzman was
published in Rolling Stone magazine on Saturday.
(Additional reporting by Tracy Rukinski and Mica Rosenberg; Editing
by Kieran Murray)
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