Forty-nine bodies with their heads, hands and feet hacked off were found dumped on a northern Mexico highway in what appeared to be the latest carnage in the escalating war between Mexico’s two dominant drug cartels.

Dozens of bodies, at least some of them mutilated, were found today dumped on a motorway near the northern Mexican city of Monterrey, officials said.

A Mexican prison brawl left 23 inmates dead today.

Mexican officials say 21 prisoners have died in a fight between inmates at a prison in the border city of Reynosa.