MEXICO CITY (AP) — Three farmers were killed Tuesday by a bomb apparently planted in a dirt road in the cartel-dominated western Mexico state of Michoacan.
A state security official who was not authorized to be quoted by name said the blast occurred in the rural township of Tumbiscatio.
Graphic photos of the scene posted on social media suggest the blast was so powerful that it blew the farmer’s truck in half and flipped it, and blew the victims’ limbs off.
It was the latest instance of what appears to be an increasing use of improvised explosive devices by drug cartels battling for control of Michoacan.
It came just days after President Andrés Manuel López Obrador acknowledged that an improvised explosive device killed at least four soldiers in what he called a “trap” likely set by a cartel in Michoacan.
The soldiers were killed Thursday on the outskirts of the city of Aguililla, Michoacan, López Obrador said Friday.
He said soldiers were inspecting a camp, likely used by cartel members, when they stepped on an anti-personnel mine set in the underbrush.
In its most recent report in August, the army said a ttacks with roadside bombs or improvised explosive devices have risen sharply. T he Defense Department said 42 soldiers, police and suspects were wounded by improvised explosive devices in the first eight months of 2023, up from 16 in all of 2022.
The army figures appeared to include only those wounded by explosive devices. Officials had previously acknowledged that at least one National Guard officer and four state police officers were killed in two separate explosive attacks in 2023.
Six car bombs have been found so far in 2023, up from one in 2022.
Overall, 556 improvised explosive devices of all types — roadside, drone-carried and car bombs — were found in Mexico between January and August 2023. A total of 2,186 have been found during the current administration, which took office in December 2018.
