Mayoral candidate murdered in northern Mexico

The mayoral candidate of the governing Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) for the northern district of Guadalupe y Calvo was found dead on 12 June, a day after he was reported kidnapped by an armed gang at or just outside his home, the website Sipse reported, citing press and agency reports. Mexico is to hold municipal elections on 7 July, although parties were withholding candidates in some districts due to threats from criminal gangs. The website observed that the conservative National Action Party (PAN) was not fielding a candidate in coming polls for Guadalupe y Calvo, one of the more isolated districts of the state of Chihuahua and in a zone rife with cartel activities. A previous town mayor also from the PRI, was shot dead in 2010, the website stated. The review Proceso separately reported on 11 June that the PAN and leftist Democratic Revolutionary Party (PRD) would not field candidates in two and seven municipalities respectively in the northern state of Durango, due to threats. Proceso counted at least 14 killings in five Mexican states on 10-11 June in incidents attributed to organized crime. The victims included two police investigators whose heads were left in a freezer by a road near Culiacán, in the northwestern state of Sinaloa.