Head of Peru's biggest airline, Aero Continente, has been placed on a blacklist of overseas drug kingpins by the United States, the US embassy in Peru said Wednesday in a news release.

Fernando Zevallos, founder of Aero Continente, were on the list,along with four Mexicans, two Jamaicans, one Indian, one Afghan, and one Mexican company.

The US decision showed the Bush administration's strong resolution to fight against drug kingpins and drug gangs in the world, the US embassy said, adding that the decision will not affect US relations with the related countries.

Zevallos has denied the drug charges and said Wednesday he would petition the US government to try him under the US justice system. His US residency "green card" was canceled in March.

Zevallos, 46, has been the subject of more than 30 US Drug Enforcement Administration investigations. He moved to the United States after Peru's biggest cocaine bust in 1995, which seized 3.3tons of cocaine in a northern Peruvian city and broke up the "Nortenos" drug gang.

He returned to Peru in 2001 to face charges of complicity with cocaine traffickers from the Nortenos gang. Despite a decade of investigations, he has never been proved guilty.

The US inclusion of Zevallos in the blacklist blocks his assetsand those of Aero Continente, which has 60 percent of the Peruvianmarket and 2000 employees.

It is a fresh blow to the airline, coming just over a month after the US Federal Aviation Administration banned the airline from flying to the United States for "safety reasons."

The airline had charged that the ban made it a scapegoat for the conflicts between Peru's Civil Aviation Authorities and the USFederal Aviation Administration.

Source:Xinhua