Mexico: Video Shows Abduction of Murdered Congressman Gabriel Gomez Michel

Mexican authorities have released a video showing the moment suspected drug cartel gunmen abducted a congressman who was later killed and his body burnt.

Gabriel Gomez Michel, a member of the lower house of congress for the ruling Institutional Revolutionary Party, was kidnapped along with his driver in the city of Guadalajara, Jalisco state, earlier this week.

CCTV footage released by Jalisco prosecutors shows the 49-year-old being violently manhandled from his vehicle into another in broad daylight.

In the 56-second video, Gomez's car - a dark SUV - is seen travelling on a three-lane street in the suburb of Tlaquepaque, when traffic suddenly stops in front of it.

Two armed men, one wearing a red shirt and the other blue, get out of a white minivan that pulls beside the congressman's vehicle and blocks it.

The gunmen force the SUV's doors open and shovel a man, believed to be Gomez, out of the car before driving it away.

A shocked Gomez is left for a few seconds alone on the roadside. Wearing a white shirt, the lawmaker is seen holding his head as he walks in evident distress.

Moments later he is reached by a second vehicle and forced into it by another gangster.

Forensic tests have confirmed that one of two charred bodies later found in a car in the central state of Zacatecas was that of Gomez.

The second victim has been identified as the congressman's driver, Heriberto Nunez Ramos.

The killings bore the hallmarks of a drug cartel murder and authorities said they suspected a criminal gang was responsible.

Gomez, a paediatrician, served as the mayor of the Jalisco city of El Grullo before being elected to the Chamber of Deputies.

Tens of thousands of people, including dozens of mayors, local police chiefs and local politicians have been killed in Mexico drug wars in recent years. Murders of federal congressmen, however, are quite rare.

Jalisco governor Aristoteles Sandoval wrote in his Twitter account that "we will work to bring to justice those responsible for these acts."