Report: New tally of 62 bodies at Mexican mass grave

MEXICO CITY -- The number of bodies discovered at a clandestine burial ground in western Mexico has reportedly risen to 62, and the digging continues.

The burial site is in the state of Jalisco, near the border with the state of Michoacan, which has been suffering from war-like violence in recent months involving drug cartels, police, the military and armed citizen militia groups.

The grave was discovered this month, and authorities initially said 19 bodies were found. The new tally was reported Friday on the website of the newspaper Reforma. Officials in the state could not be reached by The Times on Friday, and there was no word on whether any of the bodies had been identified.

Such mass dumping grounds continue to be a gruesome feature on the Mexican landscape, where a brutal drug war rages in parts of the country, and where disappearances are common. An estimated 26,000 people went missing during the 2006-2012 term of former Mexican President Felipe Calderon.

In May, the current president, Enrique Peña Nieto, announced that he would create a task force to search for the missing, but human rights groups have chided his administration for taking little concrete action.

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richard.fausset@latimes.com