Friday 30 / May / 2025
Acapulco: Dozens of Roman Catholic devotees fled a Good Friday procession in panic on Friday in the Mexican resort town of Acapulco after gunfire rang out over a nearby car robbery.
One of the robbers died from a heart attack during a shootout with police while an accomplice escaped, said the government of Guerrero, one of Mexico's most violent states.
Minutes after the confrontation, another man in a home nearby was killed in what was reported to police as a subsequent slew of gunfire. No people in the procession were reported injured.
Murder rates in Acapulco and the popular Los Cabos resort further north have soared in recent years as Mexico fights entrenched drug crime. Mexico registered a record number of murders last year, staining the reputation of the ruling Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) whose presidential candidate, Jose Antonio Meade, trails third in polls to win the July 1 election.
Campaigns officially kicked off on Friday, with the second- and fourth-place contenders holding midnight rallies to deliver vows to curb corruption and violence, two of Mexico's most critical and intertwined issues that are shaping the race.
Meade and leftist Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, who ranks first in polls, will launch their campaigns on Sunday.
