The mayor of a city in southern Mexico has been murdered less than a week after assuming office, authorities reported on Sunday, marking another grim chapter in a string of violent attacks on politicians in the country.
Chilpancingo mayor, Alejandro Arcos, was killed, an event that Guerrero State governor, Evelyn Salgado, said “fills us with indignation” in a social media post, without elaborating on the details surrounding the murder.
Local media outlets have reported that Arcos was decapitated, though this has not been officially confirmed.
Arcos was elected in June, representing an opposition coalition that included the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI), which condemned his assassination as a “cowardly crime” and called for swift justice.
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“Enough of violence and impunity! The people of Guerrero do not deserve to live in fear,” the PRI stated on X (formerly Twitter).
His death follows the murder of another city official, Francisco Tapia, just days earlier, according to PRI president Alejandro Moreno.
“They had been in office for less than a week. Young and honest officials who sought progress for their community,” Moreno lamented on X.
Guerrero, one of Mexico’s poorest and most violent states, has long been embroiled in cartel-related conflicts over control of drug production and trafficking. In 2023, the state recorded 1,890 homicides, with its resort city of Acapulco, once a haven for the wealthy, now marred by crime.
Nationwide, more than 450,000 people have been killed, and tens of thousands remain missing, in the violence that has spiraled since the government deployed the military to combat drug trafficking in 2006.
Politicians, particularly at the local level, are frequent targets of the bloodshed, often connected to corruption and the lucrative drug trade.
Addressing cartel violence remains a key challenge for Mexico’s first female president, Claudia Sheinbaum. Sheinbaum, who took office on October 1, has committed to following her predecessor Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador’s “hugs, not bullets” strategy, focusing on social policies to address the root causes of crime.
Her security plan is expected to be unveiled on Tuesday.
In the lead-up to the June elections, at least 24 politicians were murdered during a particularly violent electoral period, according to official figures.
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