In a region increasingly afflicted by drug cartel violence, armed men stormed a resort Saturday, killing a child and six other people, according to authorities.
Social media users shared videos of the attack’s aftermath in a palm-fringed resort in Cortazar, a small town 65 kilometers (40 miles) south of Guanajuato.
According to the local security authority of Cortazar, it was unclear who was responsible for the shooting that killed the seven-year-old, three men, and three women, in addition to one person who suffered serious injuries.
But in recent years, opposing drug cartels have fought bloody wars over control of the state’s borders and trafficking routes.
In a video taken shortly after the incident, astonished adults and children can be seen walking past a pile of dead bodies.
In a video posted online, an unidentified person, using the term for hired assassins, claimed: “Heavily armed sicarios arrived and this is what happened.”
Traveling Lifestyle could not independently verify the contents of the video.
“After the attack, (the attackers) fled, but not before causing damage to the resort store and taking the security cameras and the monitor,” Cortazar’s security department said in a statement.
More than 350,000 murders since 2006
Guanajuato, a state in central Mexico, has seen an increase in drug-related violence in recent years.
Although a thriving industrial sector, the region has developed into one of the deadliest in Mexico due to the ongoing war between the Santa Rosa de Lima criminal organization and the Jalisco New Generation Cartel, which specializes in drug trafficking and fuel theft.
Since the government sent the military to fight the drug cartels in 2006, there have been over 350,000 homicides in Mexico, the majority of which have been blamed on gang violence.