CIUDAD JUAREZ: Drug-related violence has claimed the lives of at least 23 people in the northern Mexican state of Chihuahua, authorities said.

Of the 23 deaths, 13 were in the city of Ciudad Juarez alone -- not far from the US city of El Paso, Texas. Ciudad Juarez is Mexico's bloodiest city with more than 2,500 murders this year alone.

In one of the cases from Sunday to Monday, a couple was gunned down in front of their children, aged 3, 5 and nine, who were not injured, police said.

Bloody violence between drug gangs, particularly struggles over lucrative drug-smuggling routes into the United States has left the region along Mexico's border with the United States one of the most dangerous in the world.

More than 14,000 people in Mexico are believed to have been killed in violence related to the drug cartels in the past three years alone.