Horrific mass grave filled with 113 ‘butchered’ corpses and skulls in bags found in cartel war zone in Mexico
AT least 113 butchered bodies have been uncovered in a mass grave in a notorious drug cartel battleground in Mexico.
The horror find was made by cops in El Salto in the western state of Jalisco - home to one of the country's deadliest crime gangs.
The state prosecutor Gerardo Octavio Solis told a press conference on Sunday night that the bodies had been found piled together.
He revealed to date just 30 have been identified by relatives - two women and 28 men.
The other victims remain as ";unidentified deceased persons" with the Forensic Medical Service,
Many of the bodies appeared to have been dismembered and multiple skulls were found dumped in bags.
The region is the home state of the "hyper violent" Jalisco New Generation Cartel (CJNG) ruled by Nemesio "El Mencho" Oseguera Cervantes.
It has seen the highest number of bodies exhumed from clandestine graves since 2006 with 897, according to a new report from the Mexican Ministry of the Interior.
Jalisco is also the state with the highest number of missing persons with 3,568 cases registered in the last two years.
Many are feared to have died at the hands of ruthless cartel killers.
The feared CJNG runs its multi-billion pound drugs empire by striking absolute terror into its rivals.
Its rise to dominance has left an appalling history of bodies and screams in its wake - ripping out victims' hearts, dissolving their bodies in barrels of acid, and even targeting pregnant women.
Mexican authorities estimate the bloodthirsty gang oversaw one-third of all drugs smuggled into the US.
Europe and Asia are also being aggressively targeted as it forges links with other overseas organised crime.
In July footage emerged showing dozens of uniformed gunmen posing in Mexico with military-grade weapons near armoured pickup trucks emblazoned with the initials of the Jalisco drug cartel.
Nationwide, the central American country is on course to break its record murder toll of 33,000 victims that was set last year.
Most of these are drug cartel victims, who were often ritually tortured, executed, dismembered and dumped in the street.
Chopping heads off is favoured and in some cases eyes have been gouged out beforehand.
Hangings on motorway bridges have become a trend and cartels even use bomb-laden drones to target their rivals.
Last month 60 bodies were also found in another mass grave in the town of Salvatierra in the neighbouring state of Guanajuato.
Authorities aid that this discovery was unusual as the grave was found within the town and not in a deserted stretch of the countryside.
The crime scene was considered so dangerous the army and National Guard provided security for the excavations.
Karla Quintana, the head of Mexico's National Search Commission (CNB) told AFP: "The vast majority of the bodies...would appear to be young people, very young, possibly even teenagers."
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At the beginning of October, the Mexican government reported it had fund 4,092 clandestine graves since 2006.
Almost half of those were in just five states: Veracruz, Tamaulipas, Guerrero, Sinaloa and Zacatecas.
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From thes graves the authorities exhumed 6,900 bodies, with the majority in Jalisco, Sinaloa , Chihuahua and Guerrero.