MEXICO CITY – A 65-year-old retired teacher **** early Wednesday, a day after suffering ******** when **** ****** cleared away protesters who tried blocking access to the airport in the resort city of Acapulco.
Guerrero Gov. Rogelio Ortega Martinez lamented the ***** of Claudio Castillo Pena in a statement released by the state. He called for dialogue and said the government had been as tolerant of the ******** as possible, but had reached a limit.
The teachers, however, responded Wednesday by blocking highways leading into Acapulco.
On Tuesday, protesters drove a bus into ****** lines in the Pacific coast resort city, injuring seven officers, Mexican federal officials said.
The Interior Department said 15 protesters also were ******* in the confrontation Tuesday evening, which came after thousands of protesters tried to block entrances to the Acapulco airport, prompting ****** to ferry tourists to the terminal in trucks.
When ****** tried to open the entrance roads, a ********* drove the bus into them. The department said some protesters had been detained, but did not give a number. On Wednesday, the state prosecutor’s office said 106 people were detained during the ********, but only eight remained in custody.
State authorities did not give a specific cause of ***** for Castillo. But Federal ****** Commissioner Enrique Galindo said on Radio Formula the preliminary medical report indicated ******** to his thorax and abdomen that could have been caused by “crushing.” Colleagues said he suffered ******** in the confrontation with ******.
When the ******** broke out, local ****** said they sheltered some airport-bound tourists at a local ****** station.
The estimated 4,500 demonstrators belonged to two radical unions protesting the Sept. 26 disappearance of 43 students. Those students were detained by ****** in the city of Iguala in the same state. The city ****** turned the young men over to a **** ****, which apparently ****** them and incinerated their remains.
The governor said those protesting in Acapulco were not the families of the missing students, but rather radical members of a teachers’ union using the banner of that cause to vandalize.
Castillo was a founding member of the Guerrero teacher’s union known by its Spanish acronym CETEG.
Acapulco is hosting the Mexican Open tennis tournament, which was not interrupted. A small group of protesters arrived outside the site of the tournament earlier Tuesday but were quickly surrounded by ******.
Acapulco hotel owners and businesses have complained that months of ********, bus hijackings and highway blockades related to the students’ disappearances have hurt Acapulco’s once-thriving tourism industry.