A checkpoint in Las Choapas (Veracruz), Mexico Public Safety of Veracruz
The discovery of 12 murdered people shook the municipality of Las Choapas, south of the Mexican state of Veracruz, on Monday.
The bodies were tied up and abandoned in the middle of a dirt road, the State Security Secretariat has reported, without disclosing the circumstances of the event, reported as a confrontation by the authorities.
The images that have circulated after the confrontation show signs of violence on the victims, lying on the road and tied hands and feet.
On Sunday afternoon, before the bodies were found, there was a confrontation between residents of the Emiliano Zapata and Tronconadas ejidos, according to local media.
State authorities have said in a recorded message that the first investigations point to a conflict between ranchers and their assistants in the area between Las Choapas and the neighboring municipality of Uxpanapa.
"The abuses and threats between them caused a confrontation between them, which had this unfortunate outcome," said Governor Cuitláhuac García, who has not delved into the motive behind the conflict.
The Ministry of Public Security has announced a police deployment in the area, with permanent checkpoints and patrols.
"The Civil Force performs overflights, while police officers have been deployed throughout the municipality and surrounding areas to find those responsible," reads a statement, which details that an investigation folder has already been started to give with those responsible.
"The Government of Veracruz reiterates that impunity is over, justice can never be done by its own hand, nor will the commission of other crimes be the solution to problems between groups," Hugo Gutiérrez, the head of State Security, has written in his social networks.
"We will reinforce the area and we will not allow revenge," added García.
The presence of self-defense groups is common in Las Choapas, some 450 kilometers from Xalapa, the capital of Veracruz.
The southern region has been devastated by the presence of organized crime groups and gangs dedicated to kidnapping and drug trafficking.
The first reports in the local press, released by the
Reuters
agency
, indicated that the murdered were members of the self-defense groups, a hypothesis that the authorities have not corroborated.
Just last November, the mayor of the Jamapa municipality, Florisel Ríos, was assassinated by an armed commando.
Veracruz, one of the hot spots of violence in Mexico, accumulated at least 1,156 intentional homicides in 2020, according to official data updated at the end of last November.