Azarias Cartagenes residents are being asked to leave the city’s streets as authorities consider closing its borders to new immigrants in the wake of the fatal shootings of three of its people.
“We are not a safe city.
We are not one of the safest cities in Mexico,” said Marisol Ceballos, an Azaria resident who has lived in Cartagens streets for nearly four decades.
“It is a place where people feel unsafe to live.”
Ceballas father, Jorge Valdez, said he has not heard from the mayor, but his son said the situation is bad enough.
Valdez told Fox News that his father was killed at least one day before.
After the deadly shooting of a Mexican immigrant in the streets of Cartagenos neighborhood, the mayor called on the community to move to the suburbs.
The mayor said there was no need for a wall, and said that “we have to be able to walk freely.”
But the city council in Cartags hometown, where Valdez lived, is opposed to that.
A city spokeswoman said Wednesday the mayor would not say what he meant by a wall but that the council would consider a proposal to erect a fence and the use of force if necessary.
The mayor’s announcement came after Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto, who was born in Cartagaras and has visited the city frequently, called on Mexicans to move out of the city, saying it is a threat to the region.
He also said the country has “not been safe for many years.”
Mexico’s Interior Ministry has launched a probe into the deadly shootings in Cartagos.
The country has not declared a state of emergency.
In a statement, the Interior Ministry said that it has opened a criminal investigation into the killings of two immigrants who died in the early morning hours of March 8 in the area of El Banderas and El Cartagas streets.
Two of the victims were women, the ministry said, and that the second victim was a 15-year-old boy.
Mexico is in the midst of a brutal migration crisis that has killed thousands.
Last month, at least 20 people were killed in Ciudad Juarez and a further 22 died in a separate incident in Jalisco state, according to government figures.