Suspected drug hitmen killed the mayor of a small town in northern Mexico yesterday in a region where two car bombs exploded last week and the bodies of 72 murdered migrant workers were found.
Mayor Marco Antonio Leal was shot dead by gunmen in SUVs as he drove through his rural municipality of Hidalgo near the Gulf of Mexico in Tamaulipas state, the local attorney general's office said. Leal's 4-year-old daughter was slightly wounded in the attack, a spokesman said.
It was not immediately clear why Leal, a member of the opposition Institutional Revolutionary Party, or PRI, was targeted. But Tamaulipas has become one of Mexico's bloodiest flashpoints since the start of the year as rival hitmen from the Gulf cartel and its former armed wing, the Zetas, fight over smuggling routes into the United States.
Mr Leal spent yesterday morning in a meeting with other Tamaulipas PRI mayors and the governor-elect, also a member of the PRI, which has long been dominant in the state.
Gunmen threw grenades at the town hall earlier this year and Hidalgo's former mayor, also from the PRI, narrowly survived an assassination attempt this month.
President Felipe Calderon, a conservative from the ruling National Action Party, or PAN, condemned the attack and vowed to continue his fight against drug gangs.
"This cowardly crime and the reprehensible violent events recently in the region strengthen our commitment to continue fighting the criminal groups that seek to terrify families (in Tamaulipas)," Calderon said in a statement.
Drug gangs killed a mayor from Calderon's party near the wealthy industrial city of Monterrey in neighbouring Nuevo Leon state this month, as attacks on public officials grow.
In a sign of escalating drug war violence, two car bombs exploded in Tamaulipas' state capital, Ciudad Victoria, on Friday, three days after marines found the bodies of 72 migrants at a ranch in the state.
Reuters