(Mexico City) Mexican authorities announced Sunday that 58 of the 66 people kidnapped in a mass kidnapping Friday in the city of Culiacán, in the state of Sinaloa (northwest) had been found.
“Today, sixteen more people returned home, twelve adults and four minors, for a total of 58 people found,” Gerardo Mérida, Secretary of Public Security for the state of Sinaloa, said on X.
The day before, the local government reported 42 people found.
“We are working to locate or determine the fate of the eight people still missing,” he added.
Sinaloa authorities have been investigating this collective kidnapping that occurred in the popular neighborhoods of Culiacan since Friday.
The local government has not indicated the reasons for the kidnappings and has not announced any arrests.
On Friday, the armed kidnappers, hooded and dressed in black, arrived in vans and fired shots into the air, according to a report from the State Security Secretariat, to which AFP had access. .
Those kidnapped belonged to seven families, according to local media.
This event occurred the day after the death of three people during an armed clash in Badiraguato (northwest), hometown of the former leader of the Sinaloa cartel, Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzmán, who is serving a prison sentence. life sentence in the United States for drug trafficking and money laundering.
With more than 450,000 assassinations and 100,000 disappearances since the launch in 2006 of a militarized offensive against drug traffickers, Mexico is one of the most violent countries in the world.