Mexico’s defense ministry said on Saturday that 16 soldiers accused of “executing” five people last month had been arrested after being caught on video beating them before shooting the suspects.

A military court issued sixteen arrest warrants on Thursday against the soldiers, accusing them of “crimes that violated military discipline,” the same source said.

The arrests follow the disclosure by foreign media on Tuesday of CCTV footage on May 18 in the city of Nuevo Laredo, in the state of Tamaulipas (northeast), which ended in a chase.

The video initially shows a black van crashing into a wall in the supermarket area. Then an armored army jeep enters the shot, which collides with the van deliberately, blocking the doors on its right side, before soldiers get out, remove five visibly dazed occupants and a long rifle. They beat the captives, blindfold some, then put them against the wall. Then, they return fire received by other suspects – they are not visible in the shot -, without any of them being injured. At the same time, a soldier who is near the prisoners shoots them.

The footage then shows soldiers placing weapons near two of the bodies and handcuffing another apparently already dead prisoner.

The president of Mexico, Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, spoke earlier this week, during the morning press conference he gives every day, about the “execution” of suspects, something “impermissible”, underlining that there will be “no cover-up” of the case.

There has been no comment from the military defense so far.

In February in the same city, Nuevo Laredo, soldiers opened fire on a car carrying seven youths leaving a party, killing five. Four soldiers are on trial for this case.