MEXICO CITY -Two suspected drug gang members were shot dead on a beachfront near the Mexican resort of Cancun on Thursday, authorities said, in an apparent gangland slaying a couple of weeks after two tourists were killed in crossfire at another beach.
The attorney general’s office in the state of Quintana Roo said warring gangsters faced off on a beach in Bahia Petempich, Puerto Morelos, and two were killed, a few hours after reports of a shooting began circulating on social media.
Police said earlier that a group of armed men carrying long guns was seen in the area of the Azul Beach hotel.
One senior state official said a group of gunmen arrived by boat in pursuit of the men who were slain, in what another Mexican official said appeared to have been a targeted “execution.”
The attorney general’s office said on Twitter that there were no other serious injuries.
Alarmed tourists tweeted that shots were being fired at a Cancun resort, where staff had told them to hide.
Twitter user Mike Sington told Reuters he took cover with other guests at his hotel. Other guests told him they heard gunshots and that a gunman had been on the beach, he said.
“In hiding in the dark now. Was told active shooter on property,” Sington said. “Paramedics are here.”
Sington later tweeted guests were taken out of hiding and brought to the lobby, where they cried and hugged each other.
At least one tourist who was in the area was treated for a head injury, local television network Milenio reported.
Mexican security forces were sent in to reinforce Tulum, a popular resort about 80 miles (130 km) from Cancun, after two foreign tourists were killed and others wounded last month during a shootout between suspected gang members.
(Reporting by Cassandra Garrison and Dave Graham; Additional reporting by Lizbeth Diaz; Editing by Jonathan Oatis, Grant McCool and Richard Pullin)
