MEXICO CITY – Mexican top drug lord Ignacio Coronel Villarreal was killed on Thursday in a gun battle with the Mexican army in the central-western Jalisco state, the Defense Ministry said.

Coronel Villarreal was a close associate of drug lord Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman, the leader of the powerful Sinaloa Cartel. The U.S. government had offered a $5-million reward for his capture.

Witnesses said that the operation started around 1:00 p.m. local time (2:00 p.m. EST) when elite forces closed roads in Zapopan, a city part of the Guadalajara metropolitan area, and surrounded at least three houses as the soldiers, many arriving by helicopter, cut off communications in the area.

Then a fierce battle ensued in which Coronel Villarreal, 56, was killed, and several of his men were captured, including Francisco Quiñonez Gastelum, one of his lieutenants, said Edgar Luis Villegas, a senior army official. During the raid one soldier was killed and another soldier was injured.

The raid, carried out by 200 soldiers of the Army and the Air Force in the Colinas de San Javier neighborhood, lasted nearly four hours.

The operation is considered the biggest blow to the Sinaloa cartel since President Felipe Calderon launched a crackdown on drug cartels in 2006.

According to the FBI, the scope of Villarreal’s influence and operations penetrate throughout the United States, Mexico, and several other European, Central American, and South American countries.

On December 17, 2003, Coronel Villarreal was indicted by a federal grand jury in the Western District of Texas. The same year, a federal arrest warrant was issued in the Western District of Texas, charging him with conspiracy to possess a controlled substance with intent to distribute and conspiracy to import a controlled substance.