Mexican troops murder 19 alleged cartel members without being hurt, according to officials.
Mexican army troops have reportedly killed 19 suspected cartel affiliates during a Monday shootout near Culiacan, the state capital of Sinaloa.
prativad 
According to the Defense Department, Mexican army personnel killed 19 alleged drug cartel gunmen in a battle without suffering any injuries.
The ruling Morena party has accused previous administrations of committing executions or violating human rights because of their disproportionate death tolls, which included many suspects but no troops.
On the outskirts of Culiacan, the state capital, the conflict took place on Monday in the northern state of Sinaloa. Since early September, infighting between two groups of the Sinaloa cartel has rocked the area.
The department said that before the confrontation, troops detained a top lieutenant of the "Mayitos" faction, loyal to imprisoned drug lord Ismael "El Mayo" Zambada. The army did not give the name of the suspect, who they identified only by nickname "El Max."
The army then said troops were attacked by more than 30 assailants, at least 11 of whom managed to escape and 19 of them were killed when soldiers returned fire.
The Defense Department claimed soldiers acted in self-defense and "strict adherence to the rule of law and with full respect for human rights."
It said that 17 rifles — including a .50-caliber sniper rifle — as well as four machine guns were seized at the scene.
The current round of fighting broke out after Zambada claimed he was forced aboard an airplane on July 25 by another drug capo who flew them both to the United States and turned them in to U.S. authorities.
The man Zambada claimed had kidnapped him — Joaquín Guzmán López, one of the sons of imprisoned drug lord Joaquín "El Chapo" Guzman — is a leader of a rival cartel faction known as the "Chapitos."
The shootout Monday was the most lopsided confrontation since the killing of 22 suspects by soldiers at a grain warehouse in the township of Tlatlaya, in the State of Mexico, in 2014.
While some of the 22 died in an initial shootout with an army patrol — in which one soldier was wounded — a human rights investigation determined that at least eight and perhaps as many as a dozen suspects were executed after they surrendered.
Seven soldiers were arrested, freed and then arrested again years later on charges of abuse of authority.
