Playa del Carmen:
seven men dead after shooting at bar in Mexican resort
Attack occurred late Sunday in a low-income section relatively far from the beachside tourist
zone, police said
Low-income: Place where people earning less
than average
Associated Press in Mexico City Mon 7 Jan 2019 18.16 GMT
Seven men have been killed in a shooting attack
at a bar in Mexico’s Caribbean coast resort city of Playa del Carmen,
authorities said Monday.
Police officers search evidence at Las
Virginias in Playa del Carmen on 7 January. Photograph: Lourdes Cruz/EPA
State and local police said the attack occurred
late Sunday at the Las Virginias bar in a low-income section relatively far
from the beachside tourist zone. Six men were found shot to death in the bar,
and another died at a local hospital.
One man was wounded but survived the attack. He
told police he was drinking beer with friends when gunshots broke out. The
attackers have not yet been
identified.
Playa del Carmen, located on the coast facing
the island of Cozumel, is Mexico’s leading cruise ship
destination. Once a quiet fishing and ferry town, Playa del Carmen has grown
exponentially in the last two decades, with lower-income neighborhoods
springing up on the inland side of the coastal highway.
Leading: Principal, top.
The resort is midway between Cancún, to the
north, and Tulum, to the south, in the coastal state of Quintana Roo, which has
seen homicides more than double in the last year, with 688 killings in the
first 11 months of 2018, compared to 322 in the same period of 2017. At that
rate, Quintana Roo could end 2018 with a homicide rate of about 50 for every
100,000, on a par with
El Salvador.
The Caribbean coast – especially Cancún and the
area south known as the Riviera Maya – had long been largely spared
the drug violence affecting other areas, but that no longer appears to be the case. Local sources
report that the feared Jalisco cartel has moved into the region, disputing
control with local gangs.
Had long
been largely spared: They had avoid for long time
In September, two Mexican marines were found stabbed to death in Cancún. In a single day in August,
police found eight bodies strewn on the streets
of Cancún.
Stabbed: Killed by knives
Strew / strewed / strewn: To
spread or scatter or be spread or scattered, as over a surface or area.
In January 2017, gunmen attacked the state
prosecutors’ office in Cancun, killing four people. A day before that, a
shooting at a music festival in Playa del Carmen left three foreigners and two
Mexicans dead.
The US embassy in Mexico issued
a brief travel warning for Playa del Carmen in March. A February 2018 blast on
a ferry apparently caused by an explosive device injured 26 people, including
several American citizens.
Issue: If you issue a statement or a
warning, you make it known formally or publicly.
That has sparked fears that
the Caribbean resorts could come to resemble the faded Pacific coast resort of
Acapulco. The bloody violence in Acapulco that flared in 2006 eventually earned
it a level-four “do not travel” warning from the US Department of State.
Spark: If a burning object or
electricity sparks a fire, it causes a fire.
Fad: A custom, style, etc. that many
people are interested in for a short time; passing fashion; craze
Still, violence in Playa del Carmen is still
far from Acapulco levels. In 2017, Acapulco had a homicide rate of 103 for
every 100,000 inhabitants, one of the highest in Mexico and the world.
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