Mexican border town gripped by fear after gunbattle kills 22

VILLA UNION, Mexico — A small town near the U.S.-Mexico border began cleaning up Monday, gripped by fear after the killing of 22 people in a ferocious weekend gunbattle between drug cartel members and security forces.

A 72-year-old woman living near Villa Union’s city hall recounted how she huddled with two of her grandchildren inside an armoire during the shooting.

The street in front of her home was littered with shell casings, and her walls and door were pocked with bullet holes.

“I’m still trembling,” she said, speaking on condition of anonymity out of fear for her safety. “We’ve never seen anything like this. It was as if they just wanted to sow terror.”

Around midday Saturday, armed men in a convoy of dozens of vehicles arrived in Villa Union and began shooting up city hall.

Many of the vehicles were emblazoned with the cartel’s initials — CDN, for Cartel del Noreste, or Northeast Cartel — as were the attackers’ bulletproof vests.

Coahuila Gov. Miguel

Riquelme said state security forces arrived within an hour and surrounded the town, about 35 miles southwest of Eagle Pass, Texas.

Sixteen gunmen were killed, along with four state police officers and two civilians, he said.

On Monday morning, the town of about 6,000 people was strewed with burned-out vehicles, and the city hall’s facade was so riddled with bullet holes it looked like a sieve.

“They wanted to send a message” to the state government, Riquelme told the Mexican network Radio Formula.