The remains of one of 43 Mexican university students who went missing two months ago have been identified, in what is the first concrete evidence in a case that has caused a political crisis in Mexico.
The student’s DNA was identified among charred remains found several weeks ago near a garbage dump, said family and government officials.
Though there was no official announcement Saturday, relatives and fellow students at the Rural Normal School in Ayotzinapa said experts had confirmed the identity of missing student Alexander Mora, a teenage farmer whose classmates called him “The Rock” for his determination.
“He was a classmate who was very strong, very persevering toward his goals,” said student leader Omar Garcia. “It’s a big loss.”
The families, who have been in limbo since the students disappeared after a protest in late September, were given the information late Friday by an Argentine team of forensic experts working on behalf of the relatives and with the Attorney General’s Office, relatives said.
The identification confirmed what Attorney General Jesus Murillo Karam told parents in November: that the students rounded up in a conflict with police had been killed and incinerated by a drug gang.
The fact that there were no witnesses and barely a trace of the 43 young men led parents to discount the story, saying they would keep searching and expected to find their children alive.
“This proves the government's assertion that drug cartel hitmen burned the bodies of the students in this garbage dump. They had confessions but it was hard to prove, but now they know this happened to at least one person,” said FRANCE 24’s correspondent Ioan Grillo.
If all 43 are confirmed dead, it would rank among the worst mass murders in a drug war that has killed more than 80,000 people and left 22,000 others missing since 2006 in Mexico.
The case has sparked domestic outrage and drawn international condemnation, highlighted Mexico's struggle with corruption and undermined President Enrique Peña Nieto's assurances that his security policy was bearing fruit.
Parents of the missing marched with thousands of people Saturday evening in a previously plannedprotest in Mexico City.
“The parents will not rest until we have justice,” said Felipe de la Cruz, father of one of the missing students.
Noting that the identification is for just one of the 43 disappeared, he said, “If they think one confirmation will leave us simply to mourn, they’re wrong. We will find the other 42.”
The students went missing Sept. 26 after confrontations with police in the city of Iguala during which three students and three bystanders were killed.
Murillo Karam has said the students were attacked by police on orders of Iguala’s then- mayor, José Luis Abarca, who has since been detained after going into hiding. Authorities are holding more than 70 people in the case, which also forced the governor of Guerrero to resign.
Prosecutors say the students were later turned over to a drug gang, which killed them. During a Nov. 7 announcement about the discovery of remains, the attorney general said that some detainees had told officials that they burned the 43 bodies at a dump site and threw their bagged-up ashes in a river.
Bone fragments were sent to the University of Innsbruck in Austria, which was recommended by the Argentine forensic team as having one of the most experienced laboratories for identifying deteriorated remains. The identification of Mora came from the Austrian lab, said student David Flores, who was at the protest. The Argentine forensic experts couldn’t be reached Saturday.
'Justice' and 'Peña out!'
The case has ignited citizen indignation across Mexico and abroad over the fact that the students disappeared at the hands of a corrupt local government and that federal authorities took 10 days to intervene.
The case has turned into the biggest challenge of President Enrique Peña Nieto's two-year presidency.
His approval rating has plunged to around 40 percent, the worst for a president in almost two decades.
Tens of thousands have taken to the streets, some calling for Peña Nieto to resign. The case has come to signify the abuse of authority and corruption that is engrained in the Mexican system and that all Mexicans experience on a regular basis.
Marching to the protest site Saturday, people filled streets in central Mexico City shouting, “Justice,” “We want them alive,” and “Peña out.”
Reforms
Pena Nieto returned to Guerrero last week for the first time since the students went missing more than two months ago.
The case has put security back at the centre of Mexico's agenda, shattering Pena Nieto's attempt to move the narrative away from the drug war to his internationally acclaimed energy and economic reforms.
The Mexican leader will host the Ibero-American summit in the eastern city of Veracruz on Monday and Tuesday.
Late last month, Peña Nieto unveiled a plan to enact constitutional reforms aimed at disbanding the country's notoriously corrupt municipal forces, replacing them with state agencies.
But security experts have voiced scepticism, saying the plan should tackle corruption at the state and federal levels too
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