The governor of the state of Chihuahua in northern Mexico, Maru Campos, announced that the bodies of two elderly Jesuits were found dead in a church, where a man was trying to escape from armed attackers.
Two Jesuit priests killed in church shooting in Mexico
“We were able to locate and recover [os corpos] of the Jesuit priests,” Javier Campos Morales, 79, and Joaquín César Mora Salazar, 80, the governor said, in a video posted on social media Wednesday night.
The president of Mexico, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, confirmed this Wednesday that the suspected killer has been identified and is now wanted by authorities, who are offering a $250,000 reward (237 thousand euros) for any information leading to the arrest of the suspect.
This is a 30-year-old man, José Noriel Portillo, already wanted for the murder of an American tourist in 2018, local press reported.
Pope Francis on Wednesday mourned the deaths of the two Jesuits and the man, identified as a tour guide, who sought refuge inside a church in the remote Chihuahuan mountain town of Cerocahu.
The Pope, who belongs to the Society of Jesus, expressed “sadness and consternation.”
“So many murders in Mexico. I am close, in affection and in prayer, to the Catholic community affected by this tragedy,” Francis said, reiterating that “violence does not solve problems, but increases unnecessary suffering.”
The Society of Jesus requested “protective measures”stressing that Monday’s attack It was not an “isolated act”since “every day men and women are arbitrarily murdered” in Mexico.
The Episcopal Conference of Mexico also condemned “the tragedy”, asking for “a prompt investigation” as well as greater security for the country’s religious.
Experts said the mountains of Chihuahua are a route for drug smuggling into the United States, a route disputed by drug cartels.
Members of various religious orders are trying, in some regions of Mexico, to act as mediators between residents and organized crime groups.
In the states of Michoacán (west) and Guerrero (south), some clerics rely on dialogue with drug traffickers to pacify these regions.
Thirty priests were murdered in the last decade in Mexicoaccording to the non-governmental organization Centro Católico Multimedial.
Source: Observadora
