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The 11 people, including two minors, found dead in a pickup truck in southern Mexico were part of a group reported missing last month, authorities in Guerrero state said Friday.

The victims, aged between 13 and 53, were part of a group of 17 people reported missing a few days ago in the city of Chilapa.

They were reported to be peddlers.

Their bodies were found late Wednesday in a truck on a boulevard in the Guerrero capital of Chilpancingo, whose mayor was beheaded last month less than a week after taking office.

Two women, four juveniles and five adult men from the community of Chautipan, an hour’s drive west of Chilpancingo, “who were wanted by this office, have been identified,” state prosecutors said in a statement.

General Pedro Nieto, the head of the region’s armed forces, said they were believed to have been kidnapped by the Los Ardillos drug cartel.

The army had been deployed to look for them.

The vehicle was found on a highway to Acapulco, the former beach playground of the rich and famous now ravaged by criminal violence.

The bodies had been dismembered, complicating identification efforts.

On October 22, ten of the victims disappeared, with the remaining seven disappearing four days later when they went searching for their loved ones.

Guerrero has suffered years of bloodshed from turf wars between drug cartels, with residents often caught in the middle.

Criminal gangs in Mexico often use so-called “hawks” who identify and track foreigners in the territory they control.

Last week, three more dismembered bodies were found in a vehicle in Chilpancingo.

Spiraling violence, largely related to drug trafficking and gangs, has killed more than 450,000 people in Mexico since 2006.

Among the victims was Chilpancingo Mayor Alejandro Arcos, whose gruesome killing in early October caused shock and anger.

Last year, 1,890 murders were recorded in Guerrero, which is home to drug production and trafficking routes, including through Pacific seaports.

On October 24, armed clashes between suspected criminals and security forces left 19 people, including two police officers, dead in the southern state.

And on Monday, gunmen killed five members of the same family in a suburb of Acapulco.

The cartel’s northwestern Sinaloa stronghold has also seen an increase in violence since the July arrest of Ismael Zambada in the United States sparked a wave of gang fighting.

Addressing the criminal violence that makes murder and kidnapping a daily occurrence in Mexico is among the major challenges facing President Claudia Sheinbaum.

The former mayor of Mexico City, who became the country’s first female president on October 1, has ruled out declaring “war” on drug cartels.

Instead, she pledged to continue her predecessor’s strategy of using social policy to tackle crime at its roots, while making better use of intelligence.