Government Reform in Mexico : Searching for Lost Souls

"[Close to five thousand bodies have been discovered in over 3,000 graves since late 2006]."
"This is about thousands of people seeking family members who are missing from their homes. It's the first time we've said, 'This is the magnitude of the problem'."
Karla Quintana, head, National Search Commission, Mexico

A mass grave found in Pueblo Viejo, in the outskirts of Iguala, Guerrero state, Mexico, on Oct. 6, 2014.Pedro Pardo/AFP/Getty Images

Quinto Elemento Lab, an investigative journalism organization in Mexico, published a report identifying 1,978 hidden graves recently uncovered, in November of 2018. Now it transpires that this is an underestimate of the actual numbers of both graves and those lying in them, victims of the raging narco-violence that has plagued Mexico for decades. According to Karla Quintana, 3,024 informal graves were discovered, containing thousands of bone fragments, alongside 4,874 bodies.

Since 2006, an estimated 40,000 people have disappeared, with officials believing that the vast majority had been victims of organized crime groups and that local or state authorities in many instances might have been complicit. Most searches have been taken on by relatives of the missing who have formed groups to dig among the barren desert plains and forest-covered hills for signs of mass graves in a search for their loved ones.

This situation has been happening for years, with the government of Mexico taking little interest despite pleas for help.

Police and forensic personnel holding white bags for corpses stand by an unmarked grave in 2014 in Guerrero state, Mexico -- a country that has suffered a wave of violence since launching the so-called "drug war" (AFP Photo/YURI CORTEZ)

Mexico's new President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador is now involving the federal government to discover the whereabouts of vast numbers of 'disappeared' Mexican citizens. Beginning during the presidency of Felipe Calderon -- from 2006 to 2012 -- a sharp rise in the number of disappearances occurred when a U.S.-backed offensive against powerful drug gangs was initiated, with the military deployed to fight the criminal groups and killings began to soar in numbers.

After a decline in recent years, violence began to spike once again from 2017, and at present has approached historic levels. Once-mighty cartels have been split into warring factions, according to analysts. Another reason for the increase in violent atrocities leads to the disruption of corrupt political deals where drug traffickers were at one time protected. With electoral competion replacing Mexico's traditional one-party rule, a change in government attention has taken place.

The graves uncovered vary in size, some containing a few bodies, others with dozens, leading o the discovery in the past nine months alone of five hundred and twenty-two graves. Bodies of missing have ended up in places other than these clandestine graves, however. There has been a deluge of corpses brought to state medical examiners' offices leading authorities to suspect thousands of the bodies were buried in the mass graves minus any method of identification.

The UN Committee on Enforced Disappearances focuses on government forces' involvement in abductions. For years the government of Mexico has viewed this as a sensitive topic, with a reluctance to have the UN investigate abuses possibly leading to military involvement. The new government now plans to invite the UN commission to proceed to investigate the country's disappearances.

"This is a request that the United Nations had made since 2013, but the prior government declined to give permission", explained Alejandro Encinas, sub-secretary of Mexico's Government Ministry.

Relatives of missing persons, hold signs with the photos of their loved ones during a march commemorating the International Day of the Disappeared in Guadalajara, Mexico, on Aug. 30, 2019. Ulises Ruiz/AFP/Getty Images