Students Vow Continued Protests Over Disappearance Of 43 Schoolmates In Mexico

“We want them to find our schoolmates,” said Raymundo, a spokesman for a group of 95 students who occupied a subway station that services of one the city’s largest markets. John Stanton reports for News from Mexico City.













Students in a Mexico City subway station protest the disappearance of 43 of their colleagues


John Stanton / Via











MEXICO CITY — Students from the Escuala Normal de Especializacion began occupying metro stations in this bustling city Thursday as part of ongoing efforts to pressure Mexican authorities to find 43 missing students in the state of Guerrero.
The students, who attended one of the 16 Escuela Normales in the country that train poor and rural teachers, disappeared Sept. 26, following a confrontation with local police.
"We want them to find our schoolmates," said Raymundo, a spokesman for a group of 95 students who briefly occupied the Estacion Metro Merced, which services of one the city's largest markets.
























John Stanton / Via











Investigations into the disappearance has lead to not one but nineteen mass graves. None so far have contained the remains of the students, though the most recent is still undergoing forensic tests. Investigators currently believe that after firing on the students — who had commandeered several buses to take them to a protest — the police delivered missing students to members of the Guerreros Unidos cartel, telling them that the students were members of a rival drug gang.

Two cartel hit men admitted to killing at least some of the students and dumping them in a pit -- although their bodies have not yet been recovered, the Financial Times reported earlier this month. So far, 56 people have been arrested in connection to the disappearance.

The incident has sparked mass protests across Mexico, including here in the capital where college and high school students have engaged in marches and temporary occupations for weeks, and student activists are organizing a general strike that could start November 5th.







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