35 bodies dumped on road as Mexican drug war continues

Masked gunmen block avenue in Boca del Rio and leave behind corpses reported to include men from mass prison escape Masked gunmen have blocked traffic on a busy avenue in the Mexican coastal city of Boca del Rio and dumped the bodies of 35 murder victims in front of motorists, according to authorities. Veracruz state attorney general Reynaldo Escobar Perez said the bodies were left piled in two trucks and on the ground of an underpass. Police had identified seven of the victims as being linked to organised crime. The Gulf and Zetas drug cartels have been locked in a bloody war for control in Veracruz state over the last year. Motorists first began tweeting on Tuesday afternoon that masked gunmen in military uniforms were blocking Manuel Avila Camacho Boulevard and pointing their guns at civilians. Local media reported that among the dead were some of 32 prisoners who escaped from three Veracruz prisons on Monday. Escobar said he could not confirm that. Police have recaptured 14 of the escapees alive. Earlier on Tuesday the Mexican army had announced the capture of a key figure in the Knights Templar drug cartel involved in violence in western Mexico. Saul Solis Solis, 49, a former police chief and one-time congressional candidate, was captured on Monday in the cartel’s home state of Michoacan. Solis is considered one of the principal lieutenants in the Knights Templar, which split late last year from La Familia, a pseudo-religious drug gang known as a major trafficker of methamphetamine. He is accused in various attacks on the military and federal police, including one in May 2007 that killed an officer and four soldiers. Mexico’s attorney general had offered a $1.1m reward for information leading to his capture. President Felipe Calderon launched an offensive against organised crime in 2006 in his home state of Michoacan, where much of the violence had been attributed to La Familia. Knights Templar became a splinter group after the leader of La Familia, Nazario Moreno Gonzalez, was killed in a shootout with federal police last December. A second La Familia leader, Jose de Jesus Mendez Vargas, was arrested in June, leading Calderon’s government to say it had all but dismantled the gang. But violence continues in Michoacan and other parts of western Mexico where Knights Templar is trying to control territory. Both groups claim to be devoted to God and to be fighting poverty and injustice under a strict code of conduct. Drug violence has claimed more than 35,000 lives across Mexico since 2006, according to government figures. Others put the number at more than 40,000. Mexico Drugs trade guardian.co.uk

Posted by on September 20, 2011. Filed under News, Politics, World News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.