Out & About: Laredoans spotted at UETA Jamboozie 2023.Just last week, another mother searching for her disappeared child was killed in violence-wracked city of Celaya, in the north-central state of Guanajuato. Others have received death threats and been forced to flee their homes. Some mothers have been slain themselves while searching for their children. Raising one's voice in Mexico can be a dangerous endeavor. … They are the only ones moving things forward.”Ĭruz said she reported her son’s disappearance to local police, even working with them to try to track his location on his phone, but she complained authorities have done little to nothing. “These mothers know that if they don’t do anything, then the state won’t do anything. “The cost to people who commit disappearances is basically close to zero,” Gallagher said. Mothers like Cruz are often the ones who take authorities to task, and even take up investigating their children’s disappearances, and likely slayings. The only thing that matters is finding our children.”Ĭompounding the bloodshed is a lack of punishment for those reponsible as the government does little to investigate such disappearances, said Janice Gallagher, a professor at Rutgers University-Newark who is writing a book about the families of Mexico’s disappeared. If (the cartels) want to do something to me, they can do it,” Cruz said. Hundreds of others walked past rows of similar photos and signs. Underneath his photo a sign read: “We miss you love. But the president, who has repeatedly played down rates of violence in Mexico, did not once mention the mothers of the disappeared, who have gained a spotlight in recent years amid their calls for justice.ĭuring the demonstration, Cruz carried a photo of her smiling son in a clean white button-down shirt. He listed teachers, journalists, grandparents, Indigenous women, laborers, businesswomen and more. Shortly before the march, President Andrés Manuel López Obrador sent out a message of “affectionate congratulations to all the mothers in our country.” It underscores the rising levels of violence in Mexico amid increasingly violent power struggles among warring drug cartels and other criminal groups. While researchers and activists say the real number is likely far larger, the figure represents a more than 20% increase from the same period last year. So far this year, 4,145 people have been reported as disappeared, according to government figures. With hope of finding her son dwindling, Cruz joined with hundreds of other parents whose children are missing to march through Mexico City demanding answers as the country observered Dia de la Madre - Mother's Day.Īs violence deepens and disappearances grow more common in Mexico, the day brings little more than anguish for mothers like Cruz. “You make yourself sick, you get up, you cry, you don’t eat. “Not knowing where your child is, it’s like this horrible hopelessness - knowing that someone took him and you can’t do anything about it,” Cruz said Wednesday.
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