Police excavated more remains Thursday after 59 bodies were already discovered in hidden graves in the central Mexican state of Guanajuato in the last few days at a site widely known as a cartel battleground.

Guanajuato is one of the country's most violent areas, with its wealth and sizable energy infrastructure attracting criminal groups. It was the biggest burial site of its kind found so far in the state with the most number of killings in Mexico, although larger secret burial locations have been dug in other parts of the country.

A team consisting of over 80 people scoured the area in 18-hour shifts, and 52 excavations were made that led to the discovery of the bodies, state commissioner Hector Diaz, said. Pending expert confirmation, between 10 and 15 women are among the victims, Karla Quintana, chief of Mexico's National Search Commission, said.

Karla Quintana, the head of Mexico's National Search Commission, said Guanajuato has recorded over 2,200 killings in the state in the first eight months of 2020. The horrific discovery came after relatives of the missing persons alerted the police, Quintana said.

In an interview with W Radio, Quintana said that residents had to have knowledge of bodies being disposed of in the area. "This place is in a neighborhood... to get there you have to pass homes, you have to pass streets... the people know," The Associated Press quoted him as saying.

Guanajuato has been jolted by escalating violence tied to a turf war between powerful rival cartels Santa Rosa de Lima and Jalisco New Generation. In July, unidentified armed men barged into a drug rehabilitation facility in the city of Irapuato and shot dead 27 people. The murder took place after a similar attack on a rehab center in the same city less than a month before.

Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador Thursday said the situation in Guanajuato is "very difficult." The presence of the National Guard in Guanajuato was at least to enable authorities to reach areas that were previously inaccessible because of the influence of organized crime.