Mexican government officials sent soldiers to to calm the violence between vigilantes and the drug cartel in the Michoacan state on Monday night, but instead caused more havoc after shooting into a crowd of civilians, the Associated Press reported.
A convoy of soldiers were sent into Antunez on Monday night when they were met with townspeople who had heard they were there to disarm the vigilante group who have been protecting the town from the Mexican cartel, according to the AP.
According to witnesses, many of the townspeople surrounding the convoy were not part of the self-defense group and were unarmed, the AP reported. As the civilians blocked the convoy from entering, soldiers fired into the crowd.
Despite mixed reports of the death toll, an AP reporter saw two dead bodies of men who died during the confrontation but no women or children.
"This is how they plan to protect the community? We don't want them," Gloria Perez Torres told the AP as she grieved over her dead brother, one of the victims killed in the clash Monday night.
A spokesman for the defense group, Estanislao Beltran, told a local radio station the soldiers "opened fire on civilians. How it that justified?" according to the AP.
"We don't have confidence in the government," Beltran said, the AP reported. "We've asked for help for years and have received the same. The government is compromised by organized crime."
Beltran confirmed there were between 60-80 soldiers and witnesses say there were just as many civilians involved in the clash, the AP reported.
A death toll was not confirmed by the Attorney General's Office and the Interior Ministry said it was not aware of the confrontation between government soldiers and civilians, according to the AP.
A security analyst who used to work for Mexico's intelligence agency said the governments plan in Antunez was a "disaster," the AP reported.
"Last week they were protecting the vigilantes," Alejandro Hope, director of security policy at the Mexican Competitiveness Institute, told the AP. "Secretary Osorio practically said they were useful ... now they're going to put them down with firepower and bloodshed?"
The government arrested numerous vigilantes a month ago, but were recently working with the self-defense groups even providing air support as they attacked the cartel, the AP reported. The government has yet to intervene in the battles between the vigilantes and the Cartel.
After a weekend of gun fights leading the vigilantes to gain control over the communities of Antunez, Paracuaro and Nueva Italia, Interior Minister Miguel Angel Osorio Chong announced the vigilantes should "put down their arms and return to their home communities," adding the government would not tolerate law-breakers, the AP reported.
