US ambassador to Mexico on abduction, killings by cartel

U.S. Ambassador Ken Salazar told Friday that U.S. officials had contacted President Andrés Manuel López Obrador directly over the weekend to ask for help in locating the missing Americans in Matamoros.Last Friday, the four Americans crossed into Matamoros from Texas.

About midday, they were fired on in downtown Matamoros and then loaded into a pickup truck.Authorities located them Tuesday morning on the outskirts of the city, guarded by a man who was arrested. Two of them died in the attack; and the rest survived.