Protesters Free Police After Clash at College

Hundreds of protesters freed 65 police officers they captured during a clash concerning control of a teachers college, news reports said Sunday.

Several police and protesters were injured during the weekend protest in Tepatepec, about 50 miles north of Mexico City, the reports said. Protesters also burned more than a dozen police cars.

State and local officials met briefly Sunday to discuss the conflict at the Tepatepec college, but there was no word of an agreement.

The latest violence began as hundreds of state police raided the school early Saturday to end a 7-week-old student takeover. Dozens of students were arrested.

The raid prompted hundreds of students and supporters to converge on the school. Most of the police managed to leave, but at least 65 were surrounded by the crowd, stripped of their shirts and marched to the town plaza.

The officers finally were freed late Saturday after officials released the detained students.

The school has long been a hotbed of leftist political activism, and many town residents apparently supported the students’ demands for more scholarships and the removal of a few school administrators they accused of corruption.