Gunmen attacked two police stations in the southern Mexican state of Guerrero on Tuesday, killing at least seven people, according to local media reports.

Authorities did not say if the attackers were guerrillas or gangsters, or whether the two attacks, in Acapulco, a tourist resort about 300 km south of Mexico City, were related, according to the reports.

In the first attack shortly before 11:00 a.m. (1700 GMT), gunmen wearing green military uniforms and red berets killed three agents with rifles.

The second attack came about 30 minutes later in another neighborhood of the town in which four people were killed, including a woman.

Guerrero is a stronghold of drug traffickers, who fight for lucrative smuggling routes for cocaine from South America. Two guerrilla forces, the Insurgent People's Popular Revolutionary Army and the People's Revolutionary Army, also operate there.

The rebels normally claim responsibility for attacks on police. However, it remains unclear who was behind the latest assaults.

The attacks came just one day after a similar case in the town of Tecpan, 96 km west of Acapulco. There were no casualties in that grenade attack.

The violence appeared to be an open challenge to President Felipe Calderon, who took office on Dec. 1 with promises of a crackdown on organized crime. Thousands of soldiers and police have been deployed in some violence-hit states, including Guerrero, on anti-crime missions.

Source: Xinhua