Scores arrested during Mexico elections turmoil: Sources
Scores of people have been arrested in Mexico during turmoil related to parliamentary and regional elections, sources say.
Seventy nine people, accused of stealing ballot boxes and setting voting documents ablaze, were detained in the southern state of Oaxaca, Mexico's police chief Enrique Galindo said on Twitter on Sunday.
Among those arrested are some members of the teachers’ union CNTE, Galindo told Mexican daily Milenio.
Furious teachers and students stormed polling stations in other parts of the North American country as well.
They called for education reforms and expressed outrage at the government’s poor response to the alleged murder of dozens of teaching students in September last year.
On September 26, 2014, 43 students disappeared in the city of Iguala in the southern state of Guerrero, following an attack by police forces suspected of having links to drug gangs. The incident took place during a protest rally by the students over hiring practices.
The parents of the students say corrupt local police abducted the trainee teachers and handed them over to a drug gang, which purportedly killed them.
Also on Sunday, masked demonstrators in the town of Trixtla in Guerrero set fire to stacks of voting documents in the streets.
In the town of Ocosingo in the state of Chiapas, protesters burned ballot boxes and ballots. Eleven people were reportedly detained.
Eligible voters went to the polls on Sunday to elect 500 members of the lower chamber of the Mexican Congress as well as some 900 mayors, and nine governors.
Latest polls indicate that the ruling Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) will keep its position as the most powerful party despite minor losses. The preliminary results of the vote are expected to be released on Monday.
MSM/HJL/HRB
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