27 Bodies Found After Suspected Drug Attacks In North Mexico

Above :-The corpses of men in Tijuana, Baja California, northwest Mexico.

TIJUANA, Mexico (AFP) — Mexican police found eight bodies, two of them decapitated, in the northwestern border city of Tijuana, and 19 others after separate attacks further east in the border state of Chihuahua in the past 24 hours.

Border areas where rival drug cartels are battling for control of key routes into the United States are among the worst hit in escalating violence across Mexico this year in which almost 3,500 have died, according to local media.

Attacks have increased despite a government crackdown on drug-related violence including the deployment of 36,000 troops across the country.

Police in Tijuana found five bodies with their hands and feet tied and heads wrapped in tape on Friday, as well as two headless bodies and one other body, making a total of 42 dead in one week.

Gangland-style murders have escalated this week in the city across the border from San Diego, including the discovery of eight bodies Thursday, and a pile of 12 bodies found in a nearby area on Monday, local officials said.

In Chihuahua state a former district attorney and four local police were killed, including a woman, out of a total of 19 dead, officials said Friday.

In state capital Chihuahua, several armed men fired from a car on the former district attorney late Thursday, state authorities said.

"On seeing his attackers he tried to run away, but they followed him and shot him several times in the back," a state official said.

In Casas Grandes, north of Chihuahua city, police found the bodies of five men, each with a bullet in the head.

Meanwhile in the border city of Ciudad Juarez, where more than 1,000 have been murdered this year, two local police were shot dead as they patrolled a residential area, state authorities said.

Four others, including two police, were also killed there on Thursday, and a former soldier and five others were killed in separate incidents in the past 24 hours.

A US resident of Ciudad Juarez, who last year put up signs calling on hitmen to avoid leaving bodies outside his house, was killed in his home Friday, police said.