| | |  News Around the Republic of Mexico | August 2008 
Mexican Minister Says Six Killed Were Friends, Not Family
 Agence France-Presse
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| | Mexican Agriculture Minister Alberto Cardenas | | |
Mexico City - Mexican Agriculture Minister Alberto Cardenas confirmed Thursday the fatal shooting of six people, including two children, in western Mexico, but denied that they were from his family.
An official and news reports said earlier that six of the minister's relatives, including two girls aged seven and eight, were found executed in his home in Jalisco.
Cardenas confirmed the killings but said that the victims had been close friends living in a house he had sold to them.
"It was a close family that didn't deserve this end. I don't have a blood relationship with this family, but we have been close for years," Cardenas told journalists here.
The former governor of Jalisco state said that he had previously owned the building where the crime was committed but recently sold it to the family because they had to leave their home after one of their relatives was abducted.
The victims included a couple, their three children and the woman's sister, and were found wrapped in blankets. All but one had been shot in the head.
The prosecutor's office said that the family could have been caught up in a robbery because one of the victims had recently withdrawn a large amount of money from the bank.
Hitmen Kill Six, Including Kids, in Western Mexico
Cyntia Barrera Diaz - Reuters
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Mexico City - Gunmen shot dead six people, including children, in western Mexico in an execution-style massacre of the kind often carried out by drug gangs, Mexico media said on Thursday.
All the victims, apparently from the same family, were shot in the back of the head and found shrouded in blankets in a house near the town of Zapotlan el Grande, online newspapers said.
Two girls aged 7 and 8, and a 15-year-old boy were among the dead.
The state of Jalisco attorney general's office declined comment on the killings, which were similar to executions carried out by warring drug gangs.
Some 1,700 people have died in drug feuds in Mexico this year. Until recently, the traffickers rarely killed children but minors have increasingly become victims in recent months.
President Felipe Calderon has sent thousands of troops and federal police to crush the drug gangs since taking office in late 2006 but the violence has not eased.
(Editing by Sandra Maler) |
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