43 missing Mexican students - Mexican authorities say 43 missing students, who disappeared from southwestern Mexico in Sept, were killed in a massacre that lasted an entire day. The college students were allegedly shot and killed in a garbage dump. Their bodies were then burned and wrapped in plastic bags before being thrown into a river.
The report of the brutal murders of the 43 missing Mexican students was disclosed by the Attorney General Jesus Murillo Karam on Friday.
Karam said in a press conference that members of the Guerreros Unidos cartel who were in custody have confessed to the brutal and complicated murder of the 43 missing Mexican students. The students, who were in a local teacher training school, disappeared on the Sept. 26 after a police attack in the southern state of Guerrero.
"I know the enormous pain the information we've obtained causes the family members, a pain we all share," Karam said. "The statements and information that we have gotten unfortunately points to the murder of a large number of people in the municipality of Cocula."
"The high level of degradation caused by the fire in the remains we found make it very difficult to extract the DNA that will allow an identification," Karam said.
In a video played by Karam during the press conference, the suspects described the killing and burring the bodies of their victims with gasoline, wood, tires, plastic and anything flammables that would keep the fire going for hours.
The video also shows the suspects confessing to being involved in the murder that lasted an entire day. They testified to packing the charred bodies of the 43 missing Mexican students into trucks before transporting them to a landfill in Cocula, a nearby city.
Reports indicate that about 74 people have been arrested in connection with the disappearance and subsequent murders of the students.
On Tuesday, the Mayor of Iguala Jose' Luis Abarca and his wife Maria de Los Angeles Pineda were arrested after they were found hiding in a Mexico City community. The pair is suspected to be the masterminds of the massacre. The Mayor and his wife reportedly ordered the police to arrest the college students, whose protests were going to spoil a party Pineda had organized.
About six students were killed in the confrontation with the police, before the 43 missing Mexican students were handed over to the cartel.
"To the parents of the missing youths, we tell them we will not relent until justice is done," President Enrique Nieto said. He noted that the disappearance and massacre of the 43 Mexican students has outraged and shocked the entire nation.
Reports indicate that the families of the 43 missing Mexican students say they don't believe that their children are dead. They accused the government of trying to close the case.
"The meeting with the attorney general was tense, because we don't believe them anymore," Martinez, who was a guardian of two of the missing students, is quoted by the NY Daily.
