Impunity is the great challenge facing the crisis of disappearances in Mexico: UN

The situation of human rights and violence in Mexico continues to be highlighted by various international organizations, which highlight the country's serious position in that regard, aggravated by the prevailing impunity.

Such is the case of the United Nations (UN), which organized a forum in which specialists and activists pointed out that, despite the progress that Mexico has made in curbing the crisis of disappearances in the country (which is close to 100,000 officially registered cases), impunity and the compliance with laws remain the great challenges ahead

“The fight against impunity is essential at this time. It's a struggle that should have been going on for a long time. In addition, search policies and legislative development are essential,” said Luciano Hazan, member of the UN Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances.

Representatives of the United Nations, held on Monday a symposium on the challenges and prospects of Mexico ten years after its report on this tragedy, at an event in which they were accompanied by relatives of victims and the Undersecretary for Human Rights, Population and Migration of the Government of Mexico, Alejandro Holm oaks.

Luciano Hazan highlighted that in the last decade, Mexico has had achievements in this area, although he pointed out that these have always been guided by family members and organizations of the disappeared.

“The work has been truly exemplary. Mexico has taken steps, listened to families, created legislation such as the General Victims Act, the Amparo Act, the Law on (Forced) Disappearance, as well as the (creation of) the National Search Commission, and approved protocols,” he said.

However, he criticized that so far no concrete results have been seen and that despite the decisions that have been taken institutionally, they are not implemented as they should, in addition to the need for resources and improved coordination between prosecutors throughout the country.

“Thousands of families are searching and there is no time to wait,” he condemned.

He recalled that another major outstanding issue is the security that the State must guarantee to seeking families, as well as journalists and human rights defenders.

“The loss of life and harassment of those who fight is the first symptom left by enforced disappearances and other serious violations of human rights. Another issue is the lack of coordination between institutions,” he said.

Faced with this, he said, it is essential to strengthen the state and federal prosecutor's offices to fulfil their fundamental role in providing justice and encouraged all branches of power, both executive and judicial, to follow the recommendations that will be made in the coming days by the UN Committee against Enforced Disappearance, following its visit to Mexico in last November.

Gabriella Citroni, a member of the UN Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances, agreed with Hazan that despite Mexico's achievements with the issue of disappearances “there is very little to celebrate” because despite everything “there are still” people who are missing.

In addition, he pointed out that it is “essential” to have institutions that know how to apply everything they have “and all the tools that have been given to them in a human way”.

In this regard, Blanca Martínez, director of the Fray Juan de Larios Center for Human Rights, said that despite the achievements, there can be no talk of progress in terms of locating missing persons, especially because of the judicial obstacles faced by families.

And he pointed out that as long as impunity continues to exist, “disappearance, unfortunately, will continue to be like impunity, something constitutive of the system of government and that can obviously be like a sentence of extermination for our peoples, because people disappear and our peoples disappear,” he said.

Alejandro Encinas, Mexico's Undersecretary of Human Rights, accepted that the Mexican government has a “big business” pending on the issue of disappearances and their fight against impunity.

“A country with 98,885 accumulated missing persons today, and where only 35 sentences are recorded for this crime, realizes the enormous backwardness that the authorities responsible for providing justice have with families,” he admitted.

For his part, Guillermo Fernández Maldonado, representative in Mexico of UN-DH, reiterated that “the fight against impunity is the main challenge” for the country on the subject.

“It is a persistent challenge not only in the area of disappearing persons, but in many other policy areas,” he insisted.

He recalled that in the coming days, the UN Committee against Enforced Disappearance will present its report on its visit to Mexico in November last year and “it will be essential to work immediately and in coordination for the effective implementation of all its recommendations,” he said.

In this regard, Encinas pledged to comply “on time” with the recommendations that the committee issues.

“We will make an effort to ensure that other orders of government, particularly in the area of administration and administration of justice, do the same, because that is where we have one of the largest outstanding allocations to address this problem,” he said.

Mexico is experiencing a missing persons crisis with more than 98,500 people unlocated from 1964 to date, according to data from the National Search Commission (CNB) of the Ministry of the Interior (Segob) itself.

With information from EFE

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