Guatemala City, Nov 6 (IANS/EFE): The charred bodies of four men were discovered Monday hidden among bushed alongside a deserted road in the northern province of Peten, Guatemalan authorities said.

Investigators are trying to determine whether the men were killed at the scene or simply dumped there by the killers, a spokesman for fire rescue said.

So far, only one of the dead has been identified: 35-year-old Jorge Tux.

The murders may have been linked to drug trafficking, police sources suggested.

Groups linked to powerful Mexican drug cartels are known to operate in Peten, which borders Mexico. The most violent of those outfits, Los Zetas, has a significant presence in Guatemala.

More than 100 Zetas have been captured in Guatemala since 2008, when the cartel began operating in the Central American country to control drugs routes running from South America to the US.

The Zetas, founded by deserters from a US-trained Mexican special forces unit, started out as the armed wing of the Gulf cartel, but the two organizations had a falling out in 2010 and the Zetas went into the drug business on their own account, gaining control of several lucrative territories.