Mexican city's mayor beheaded in attack days after taking office

Mexico's new government has been shaken by the murder of a city mayor who was attacked and beheaded just days after taking office.

- Tom Phillips

Alejandro Arcos Catalán was sworn in as mayor of Chilpancingo, the capital of the southern state of Guerrero, on 30 September, a day before Mexico's first female president, Claudia Sheinbaum, took power herself.

On Monday, less than a week into her presidency, Sheinbaum confirmed reports that the 43-year-old city leader had been killed on the previous day, saying: “All the necessary investigations are taking place.”

Photographs of Arcos Catalán's bloodied head, exhibited on the roof of a white vehicle while his body lay slumped inside, spread on social media - a terrible reminder of the violence that Mexico's organised crime conflict has inflicted.

The mayor's murder came after two close allies were shot dead in the early days of his short-lived administration. A secretary, Francisco Tapia, was gunned down on 3 October, while Ulises Hernández Martínez, a former special forces police commander who was tipped to become Arcos Catalán's security chief, was riddled with bullets on the eve of the mayor's inauguration.