A group of armed men killed 17 people working in a shoemaking workshop Tuesday in the northern Honduran city of San Pedro Sula, 250 km from Tegucigalpa, police said.

Guillermo Arias, police commissioner for northwestern Honduras, said there were 20 people in the workshop at the time of the shooting. He would not say whether the massacre was linked to organised crime.

According to a report in the Honduran daily El Heraldo, which cited eyewitnesses, the attackers entered the workshop in the San Francisco neighbourhood of San Pedro Sula at around 4 p.m. and started shooting with AK-47 rifles without saying a word.

Thirteen people died at the site, while four others died later in hospital. The public prosecutor's office said the dead were mostly between the ages of 17 and 24.

The identities of the attackers were not immediately known, although police were investigating the killings, Deputy Police Commissioner Hector Ivan Mejia was quoted as saying.

Mejia noted, however, that investigators know how many attackers there were, although he would not give further details so as not to jeopardize police efforts.

Honduras is one of the most violent countries in Latin America. Most violent deaths are linked to organised crime, especially drug trafficking.