MEXICO CITY (Reuters) -Mexican authorities are investigating an incident in Tamaulipas, a northern state bordering the U.S., where six people were fatally shot by an army convoy, renewing debate over the military’s role in areas afflicted by crime.
President Claudia Sheinbaum on Wednesday pledged to review the military’s actions during her daily press conference.
“We have a legal system where the authority, if it has an arrest warrant or is seeing that there is a crime in flagrante delicto, acts to detain the responsible party or parties, and the use of the firearm has to be rational. There is a law that establishes under what conditions,” she said.
The defense ministry’s regional office in Tamaulipas said in a statement on Tuesday that the shooting occurred on Monday night after a white pickup truck rammed one of three vehicles in a military convoy on a highway connecting Ciudad Mante and Tampico. Soldiers responded to what they considered a threat to their safety.
“Upon perceiving a threat to their physical integrity and after some maneuvers, they made use of their weapons, and unfortunately five people lost their lives and three more were wounded,” the statement said. A sixth victim, one of the wounded, later died in hospital.
In October 2024, six migrants were killed in the southern state of Chiapas, when soldiers opened fire on a pickup truck in an incident the military described as a mistaken response to explosions and perceived ties to organized crime. Local residents interviewed by Reuters cast doubt on that account.
In the most recent incident, the defense ministry said it immediately notified both the Attorney General’s Office of the Republic (FGR) and the Attorney General’s Office of Military Justice, which have opened investigations.
Tamaulipas, a region long plagued by violence linked to organized crime, has witnessed numerous massacres and has faced accusations of extrajudicial executions targeting civilians and migrants.
(Reporting by Raul Cortes;Editing by Marguerita Choy)
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