Journalist Alejandro Martínez Noguez was killed by gunmen yesterday Sunday in the central Mexican state of Guanajuato, despite being guarded by police, local authorities said.

Alejandro Martínez Noguez, a specialist in police reporting, was under protection after being the target of an assassination attempt. He was killed by unknown persons while driving a car with his bodyguards, the security secretariat of the city of Selaya clarified.

He was returning from reporting, according to the same source.

“Armed men riding in a vehicle approached them and opened fire with rifles against the vehicle designated by the municipality to transport and accompany the journalist,” he added.

AFP sources in the police explained that the journalist’s bodyguards, police officers in Celaya, repelled the attack, but a bullet hit Alejandro Martínez Noguez – who was sitting in the passenger seat – in the head.

The officer at the wheel took him as fast as he could to a hospital, where he was pronounced dead.

A woman driving another vehicle was injured by the gunfire, according to the same sources.

In 2022, Alejandro Martínez Noguez was the target of an attack and has since been permanently guarded by police in Celaya under a state program created to protect journalists who face threats, a government source confirmed.

He covered current affairs through social networking sites and had a great impact.

Mexico is one of the most dangerous countries in the world for journalists, press freedom organizations say.

In a recent report, the non-governmental organization Reporters Without Borders (Reporters sans frontières, RSF) highlighted that more than 150 information workers have been murdered since 1994 in the country, which has been swept by a wave of organized crime violence.