Mexico City, Sept. 6, (dpa/GNA) – A mayor-elect has been kidnapped in the southern Mexican state of Chiapas only a few weeks before taking office.
Authorities said on Thursday they had launched an investigation into his whereabouts.
According to media reports, armed individuals kidnapped Aníbal Roblero Castillo on Tuesday outside a café in Tuxtla Gutiérrez, the capital of Chiapas.
The exact motives behind the incident were initially unclear.
Videos circulating on social media are said to show the exact moment of the 54-year-old’s abduction.
Castillo is scheduled to take office in Frontera Comalapa on October 1. The municipality, with a population of some 67,000, is situated near the Guatemalan border, an area where two drug cartels are clashing over smuggling routes for drugs and migrants.
The region has experienced increasing violence, with many villagers fleeing their communities in recent months.