Traditional and indigenous community police in Mexico under fire from drug cartels

Associated Press

TANGAMANDAPIO, Mexico (AP) — Mexico’s traditional and indigenous community police are coming under increasingly deadly fire from drug cartels. The chief prosecutor in the western state of Michoacan confirmed Monday that assailants shot dead seven members of the community police in the city of Coahuayana (koh-why-YAH-nah) over the weekend. He said the attack appeared to be linked to fighting between drug cartels over control of coastal territory, a key route for shipping cocaine. The community guards were killed just days after seven members of an indigenous community guard were kidnapped, apparently by cartel gunmen, in another city in Michoacan but later released.