A shootout between armed forces and drug smugglers in the Mexican city of Tampico on Friday left 15 people dead and 10 wounded in the north-eastern state of Tamaulipas, local media reported.

The Army raided the area inhabited by the criminals and seized 20 tons of cocaine, radio and online press reported. Tampico city is the home to the Gulf Cartel, one of the two most powerful Mexican drug gangs.

The clash between the soldiers and traffickers wasn’t immediately confirmed by the National Defense Ministry or the public prosecutor's office.

The only official who mentioned the operation was none other than the Mexican President Felipe Calderon who talked about it in a speech in Ciudad Victoria. He was set to visit the town just a few hours after the raid took place.

"We have doubled the efforts to make the law prevail in Mexico with ... actions and interventions like those that happened recently, I can say today (Friday), in the state of Tamaulipas," Calderon said.

The drug-related violence has reached very high levels in the north-eastern Mexican state. At least 2,000 people have been killed this year alone in quarrels between the rival gangs.

Ninety percent of cocaine entering the US comes through Mexico so John Walters, the top White House official in charge of anti-drug efforts, was very pleased with the Mexican authorities and praised them for their efforts to fight the cartels that supply the white powder.

Since he began his term as Mexico’s president, Felipe Calderon sent about 30,000 troops and federal police across the country to deal with the drug gangs. Although this method was seen with skepticism at first, it seems to be the right path to follow.

The price of the white powder in 37 US cities rose since March and the purity of it has dropped by 11% over the same period showing that the traffickers are diluting their dwindling stocks to stretch it further and meet demand.

"After 25 years of cocaine coming into the United States, there has never been the kind of disruption of this magnitude for this long," Mr Walters, who also released the figures above mentioned, said.