Ottawa warns Canadians against travel to Mexico

The Canadian government on Tuesday warned its citizens against traveling to Mexico, especially to Ciudad Juarez where three people linked to the US consulate were killed over the weekend.

The foreign affairs department said on its website the travel warning was "due to escalating violence linked to drug trafficking."

"Although foreigners have not typically been targeted," Ottawa said Canadians "are advised to reconsider their need to travel to Ciudad Juarez and should only do so if it is absolutely necessary."

Mexican authorities have blamed the drive-by murders in the notorious border city of Ciudad Juarez on "the Aztecas," a gang linked to the powerful Juarez drug cartel.

US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), Drug Enforcement Administration and Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms agents are in Ciudad Juarez helping to hunt the killers of an American employee of the US consulate, her husband and the husband of a Mexican consular employee.

Two of the shooting victims were killed in a hail of bullets as they were driving back to the US side of the border with their one-year-old daughter in the back seat, officials said. The baby survived unharmed.

In a separate attack, gunmen opened fire on a car, killing the driver and wounding his two children, ages four and seven. His wife, a Mexican employee of the consulate, was following in a second car and escaped injury, a US official said.