At least 12 people including six women, were on Saturday evening, gunned down by unidentified gunmen who opened fire in a bar in the central Mexican city of Irapuato, local authorities said in a statement on Monday.
The attack, the second case mass shooting in the state of Guanajuato in less than a month, also saw three people injured as local police declared a manhunt for the assailants as the motive behind the shooting was not immediately clear.
A local government official said security officials are working on the assumption it could have been as a result of a drug deal gone bad.
The Guanajuato province which is a major manufacturing hub and production site for many of the world’s top carmakers, has been convulsed in recent years by brutal turf wars between rival drug gangs, a security expert said.
The expert recalls how 10 people were killed on September 21 by yet to be identified gunmen in an attack at a bar in the Guanajuato town of Tarimoro, about 96km (60 miles) southeast of Irapuato.
“Earlier this month, gunmen allegedly affiliated with a drug gang killed 20 people, including a mayor, in an attack in the southern Mexican state of Guerrero,” the unnamed expert said.
