In this photo taken March 30, 2010, a soldier stands guard at the site of a firefight between gunmen and army soldiers on the outskirts of Monterrey, northern Mexico. Apparently coordinated attacks by dozens of gunmen took place last Tuesday targeting two army garrisons in northern Mexico. According to the army, 18 attackers were killed during the the firefights. (AP Photo/Claudio Cruz) (Claudio Cruz, AP / March 30, 2010)

NUEVO LAREDO, Mexico (AP) — A shootout in northern Mexico between soldiers and suspected drug cartel gunmen killed two children and wounded five of their relatives who were caught in the crossfire, the latest in a string of deaths of bystanders in the nation’s drug war.

The 5- and 8-year-old brothers were traveling in their family’s car when the gunbattle broke out on a highway near the border city of Nuevo Laredo, the Tamaulipas state government said in statement Sunday night. The statement corrected an initial government report that only bystander was killed in the confrontation Saturday night.

Two suspected gunmen were also killed.

“We ran and tried to hide in the brush, but they kept shooting,” said Maria Guadalupe Delgado Castillo, an aunt of the dead children.

She sobbed as she waited outside the Nuevo Laredo General Hospital where her relatives were being treated. One family member was shot in the stomach and the other four had less severe injuries.

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