Kidnapped Mexican Catholic priest found shot dead

A Roman Catholic priest who was kidnapped in western Mexico a week ago has been found shot dead.

The body of Jose Alfredo Lopez Guillen was found late on Saturday near the town of Puruandiro in Michoacan state, prosecutors said.

He is the third priest to be found murdered in Mexico in the past week.

Father Lopez Guillen had been robbed before being abducted from his home last Monday in Janamuato, Michoacan state, Church officials said.

The Michoacan prosecutor's office said a post-mortem examination showed the priest had been killed several days before his body was found.

On the same day that he disappeared, the bodies of two other priests who had vanished the day before were found by a roadside in Veracruz, on Mexico's east coast. They had also been shot dead. It is not believed their deaths are linked to that of Father Lopez Guillen.

His death brings the number of priests murdered in Mexico since 2012 to 15, according to figures from the Catholic Multimedia Center, which monitors violence against clerics.

Veracruz and Michoacan have been plagued by years of violence from drug cartels and other organised crime.