CIUDAD JUAREZ, MEXICO -- Eight people, one of them a city councilwoman, were murdered in various incidents in the northern Mexican state of Chihuahua, authorities said Tuesday.

The bodies of two women were found Monday night next to a garbage dump in the town of Ascension, 186 kilometers (116 miles) west of Ciudad Juarez, the state's biggest city.

Officials at the state Attorney General's Office told Efe that the women, both in their 20s, were found half-naked with knife wounds and signs of being beaten, mainly about the face and head.

Authorities said the women were apparently sexually assaulted prior to their deaths.

Elsewhere, a group of armed men shot to death a councilwoman for Guadalupe, a Juarez suburb.

Cristina Aranda Villalobos, 32, was slain Monday night inside the grocery store that she owned, according to a preliminary report.

On the south side of Ciudad Juarez, located just across the border from El Paso, Texas, two decapitated bodies were found wrapped in blankets with a card attached on which threatening messages were written. The bodies had several bullet wounds.

Also on the city's south side, two men died at an area hospital after being shot while standing outside a store.

Meanwhile on the west side of Juarez a man was murdered minutes after he was kidnapped.

The abductors pushed the victim out of the car and shot him in the street.

According to newspaper figures, these murders bring to 280 the number of gangland-style killings so far this year in Ciudad Juarez and its environs.

This city is considered Mexico's most violent and last year was the scene of 1,600 of the 5,600 murders attributed to organized crime nationwide. EFE