Thousands of teachers protested in southern Mexico on today to denounce a "massacre" a day after at least eight people died during violence authorities blamed on unidentified gunmen.
A teachers union organized the demonstration in the tourist city of Oaxaca to demand justice for the deaths during a protest yesterday, while some 15 masked protesters launched fireworks at police during today's march.
The National Education Workers Coordinator (CNTE) union has been leading demonstrations across the state of Oaxaca against an education reform and the arrest of two of its leaders.
Six people died and more than 100 were injured, including officers and civilians, when police were deployed to break up a week-long road blockade by the CNTE in Asuncion Nochixtlan, near Oaxaca city.
Federal police chief Enrique Galindo said unidentified gunmen opened fire on the population and the police but that teachers were not involved in the shooting.
The National Security Commission had initially denied that police were armed during the clashes, charging that news pictures showing officers with firearms were "false."
But Galindo said officers were forced to use weapons after they were "ambushed" by 2,000 "radicals," including some of whom were armed.
Galindo told Radio Formula that "autopsies are being conducted" to determine if any of the dead were hit by police bullets.
Officials said eight police officers had gunshot wounds. At least 55 officers and 53 civilians were injured in the clashes, while more than 20 people were arrested.
A journalist, meanwhile, was shot dead by unknown gunmen after taking pictures of looting in the town of Juchitan. An eighth person was killed in the same town, said Oaxaca state security chief Jorge Alberto Ruiz.
Authorities had previously given a death toll of six but Ruiz told MVS radio that the deaths in Juchitan were "linked" to the unrest.
