Ciudad Juarez (Mexico), Nov 18 (EFE) Two drug-cartel hit men wanted for 45 killings were arrested by soldiers in this northern border city, Mexican authorities said.

Soldiers tracked down the hit men after they were wounded last Friday in a shootout with a rival gang at a Ciudad Juarez hospital, the defense department said in a statement Tuesday.

Arturo Arellano Corral, 26, and Salomon Bolivar Villa, 20, told interrogators that they worked for a cell of the Sinaloa drug cartel.

The men admitted to 45 murders, the defense department said.

Four hit men suspected in a total of 211 killings were captured in August by troops and federal police stationed in Ciudad Juarez, a gritty metropolis just across the border from El Paso, Texas.

The city has witnessed more than 4,000 gangland slayings since Jan 1, 2008. Authorities attribute most of the carnage to a turf battle between the Sinaloa organisation and the Juarez cartel.