5 killed in Mexican town caught between battling criminal groups
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Schools and some businesses were closed and few people walked the streets of this town south of Mexico’s capital Tuesday, hours after five people were gunned down on the same street where another attack left eight dead just eight months earlier. Huitzilac is at the center of a restive area in Morelos state with competing criminal organizations and illegal logging. Those killed were apparently campaigning for local positions managing the community’s collective resources, like the surrounding forest, ahead of an election scheduled for March.
Mayor César Dávila Díaz condemned the attack in a post on a social platform. “These acts have no justification and go against the principles of respect, coexistence and dialogue," he wrote. An unknown number of gunmen attacked Monday evening along Huitzilac’s main street. On Tuesday morning, traces of blood and five candles were visible on the pavement.
José Romero, a 53-year-old farmer, who lives just feet from where the attack took place, said he was watching television when he heard the gunshots. He said the town’s security is up and down depending on the presence of security forces. When the National Guard is not present, these kinds of attacks occur, Romero said.
An attack last May targeted men who were drinking beer after a soccer match, just two weeks before Mexico’s presidential election. President Claudia Sheinbaum, who won that election handily, took over a complicated security situation. Scores of criminal organizations fight for territory across Mexico, seeking to ensure safe routes to smuggle migrants, drugs and guns, but also increasingly to extort communities.
