Thousands protest ahead of Mexican president’s report on missing students

Mexico City witnessed a massive protest on Saturday, marking the 12th anniversary of the disappearance of 43 trainee teachers. The demonstration, led by parents of the missing students, called for answers about their fate. Protesters wore red and carried symbolic coffins, demanding the return of their loved ones alive. President Claudia Sheinbaum is set to release a report on Monday, detailing the latest progress in the investigation, following a thorough review by the attorney general's office.

The protest began at the capital's main square, where the government palace is located. The demonstrators, counting to 43 multiple times, honored each of the 43 teacher trainees who disappeared on September 26, 2014. Estanislao Mendoza, a parent of one of the missing students, expressed the immense suffering and hopelessness they have endured over the past 12 years. "We want to know, whether it's good or bad, alive or dead, but to know the truth, to know where they are," he said.

The incident occurred when the students were en route to a protest in Mexico City from Guerrero state. Local police stopped them in the town of Iguala, where six students were killed in a violent clash, and the remaining 43 went missing. Initially, prosecutors claimed that the officers handed the students over to drug cartel hitmen, who killed them, burned their bodies, and dumped the remains in a river.

However, independent human rights experts have dismissed this government conclusion, leaving the unsolved case to tarnish Mexico's reputation.

In August, a former governor was arrested on charges of deleting security videos from the scene of the crime in Iguala. In 2022, the former state attorney general was also apprehended. The case has claimed over 134,000 lives in Mexico, and activists argue that the government must address the indifference towards this ongoing crisis of disappearances.

Atanacio Pina, a 69-year-old father whose son remains missing, emphasized the need for support in the fight against the indifference of a government that refuses to acknowledge the existence of a disappearance crisis.