Armed assailants attacked a drug rehabilitation center in Mexico, killing four people and injuring five others, local authorities said Wednesday.
The attack took place Tuesday evening in Salamanca, in the central state of Guanajuato, the municipal government said in a statement.
The police and the National Guard “launched a chase to find those responsible”, but the attackers escaped by throwing metal spikes to puncture the tires of the security forces who were pursuing them, he added.
Police said three bodies of those killed were found inside the rehabilitation center, while a fourth was found on the street.
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No suspects have yet been arrested.
Conflicts between drug gangs have led to several attacks on rehabilitation centers in Mexico.
Authorities say some rehabilitation centers are used as a refuge by suspected members of criminal groups, who are attacked by their rivals when they are discovered.
In July 2022, six people were shot at a drug treatment center near the western Mexican city of Guadalajara. Two years ago, heavily armed men stormed a rehab center in the central town of Irapuato and killed 27 people.
Guanajuato is Mexico’s most violent state, according to official homicide statistics, due to fighting between the local Santa Rosa de Lima cartel and the powerful Jalisco New Generation. Last month, the The United States sanctioned a man known as “The Tank” for running the fuel theft arm of the Jalisco Cartel, providing it with tens of millions of dollars a year by selling stolen gasoline through a network of seemingly legitimate businesses.
Mexico has recorded more than 450,000 murders since December 2006, when a controversial military anti-drug operation was launched.
The violence continued after Claudia Sheinbaum took office Tuesday as Mexico’s first female president in the country’s more than 200 years of independence.
