Mexican authorities are reportedly investigating after a burnt-out truck was discovered in an area near the U.S. border that contained more than a dozen bodies.
Reuters reported on Sunday that the truck was discovered in a largely uninhabited part of Tamaulipas in the northeast of the country. In total, nineteen bodies were discovered. A motive and the identity of the victims have not yet been determined.
“Preliminary investigations indicate that the cause of death was shots from firearms and that the bodies were set on fire,” a statement from authorities in the region said, according to Reuters.
“One of the lines of inquiry is that the events could have taken place in a place other than the discovery,” he continued.
The area of Tamaulipas where the truck was discovered is known as a hotspot for cartel activities and trafficking in migrants.
Migrants traveling north in the hope of entering the U.S. have been confronted with violence in the region for years, exacerbated in part by so-called ‘stay in Mexico’ policies pursued by the Trump administration.
A United Nations project to track migration in Central and South America recorded nearly 500 deaths among migrant populations in the regions near the U.S.-Mexico border in 2019.