Twenty people were killed in the latest suspected Mexican drug attacks, including a US citizen, officials said, hours after US President Barack Obama vowed to help Mexico fight violent cartels.
More than 7,000 people have been killed since the start of last year in clashes between Mexican cartels and security forces, amid a military crackdown involving tens of thousands of troops.
In the latest violence, a carload of gunmen shot dead yesterday a 32-year US citizen as he entered a house in the northern border city of Ciudad Juarez overnight on Thursday, the deputy state attorney general's office said on Friday.
Police found another five bullet-riddled male bodies near a road in the same northern state of Chihuahua, the attorney general's office said, adding later that the five victims were identified as Mexican Army soldiers.
The soldiers were tortured before they were killed, a spokesman told AFP.
Police found four other bodies in the state, including that of a woman in a car with Texas license plates in Ciudad Juarez.
The government recently sent an extra 5,000 troops to that volatile border city, where more than 1,600 alone died in 2008.
{{/usCountry}}The government recently sent an extra 5,000 troops to that volatile border city, where more than 1,600 alone died in 2008.
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