Tuesday 26 March 2013

In days, 50 killed, found dead around Mexico

"At least" 18 were reported killed or found dead in presumed criminal incidents around Mexico on 24-25 March, these including five killed in a shootout between police and criminals in the north-western state of Sinaloa and an official of the state judiciary of Oaxaca, shot dead on 25 March as she emerged from a car. Victims also included three thought executed a month before, whose decomposing bodies were found on 25 March buried south of Chilpancingo in the western state of Guerrero, Proceso reported. On 22 March gunmen shot dead seven people including two Federal policemen in an eatery in Ciudad Altamirano in the western state of Guerrero, Proceso reported. The review observed that the targets of the attack may have been soldiers in civilian clothes eating in the restaurant that day, though reports did not clarify if any were among reported fatalities or the six injured of whom three were Federal policemen. The bodies of seven executed men were found on 23 March in Uruapan in the western of state of Michoacán. They were sitting in a row of plastic chairs placed at a crossroads, blindfolded and with hands tied, and later identified as window cleaners and farm workers, Milenio reported on 25 March. A deputy-governor of Michoacán asked media not to "magnify" what he termed an "isolated" incident related to drug trafficking, Proceso reported. Jesús Reyna García was cited as saying that while the state cannot assure the security of all Mexicans, people would not think ill of Michoacán - one of its more crime-ridden states - if the media did not highlight the incident, Proceso reported. Federal policemen killed five suspected gangsters in a shootout on 23 March in the district of Huatusco in Veracruz, responding to gunfire it was said, Proceso reported. In the south-central district of Xochitepec south of Cuernavaca, gunmen shot dead four men and a 15-year-old girl by a street stand. One of the victims was said to have run into a nearby building, but was followed and shot there, Proceso reported. The mayor of San Juan Mixtepec in Oaxaca and his bodyguard were gunned down while driving near that district early on 24 March, Proceso reported. Authorities' immediate "line of investigations" was not stated but Proceso observed the district had a recent history of land disputes with neighbouring Santo Domingo Yosoñama, which in one case led some 200 gunmen said to be from Santo Domingo, to have launched an assault on San Juan in January 2013. Other, isolated killings were reported around Mexico through 22-25 March, taking crime's presumed death toll to at least 50.

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