[Congressional Record Volume 162, Number 24 (Wednesday, February 10, 2016)]
[Senate]
[Page S814]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                 DISAPPEARANCE OF 43 STUDENTS IN MEXICO

  Mr. LEAHY. Mr. President, it has been well over a year since 43 
students from Ayotzinapa Rural Teachers' College were forcibly 
disappeared in the state of Guerrero, Mexico. On September 26, 2014, 
around 100 students from the college traveled to the city of Iguala. 
They were there to raise money and to obtain buses to attend a 
commemoration of the infamous massacre of more than 600 students in the 
capital in 1968.
  The now former mayor of Iguala has been accused of ordering the 
attack on the students that evening. While the motive remains a 
mystery, what appears to have occurred is that the police used lethal 
force against the students, and the 43 who are missing were handed over 
to the criminal organization Guerreros Unidos. Six people were killed 
that day, and the fate of the 43 disappeared students remains unknown.
  After it became clear, thanks to the courageous and dogged work of 
foreign journalists that a horrific crime had been covered up by 
Guerrero officials and the police, the Mexican Government established 
the Interdisciplinary Group of Independent Experts of the Inter-
American Commission on Human Rights to provide independent analysis and 
technical assistance to the government.
  The experts' September 2015 report, released on the eve of the 1-year 
anniversary of this tragedy, exposed significant deficiencies in the 
government's handling of the investigation and provided an opportunity 
for the government to restore the integrity of its own inquiry. The 
government's decision to extend the experts' mandate in the fall was a 
welcome signal of political will and a desire to build credibility.
  But as the end of the experts' mandate nears, President Pena Nieto is 
running out of time to demonstrate that that political will has a 
lasting impact. The manner in which this investigation is conducted has 
grave implications not only for the victims of the attacks in Iguala 
and their families, but for the victims of countless other incidents in 
which Mexican citizens have vanished during the past decade and remain 
unaccounted for.
  I urge the Mexican Government to fully support the experts' 
investigation by ensuring maximum cooperation of all Mexican officials, 
including on issues related to the experts' access to all those 
potentially involved in this incident and the serious pursuit of all 
possible leads the experts have identified, including by soliciting 
assistance from the United States.
  I also urge the government to publicly refute the campaign that some 
have waged to delegitimize the experts as a way to discredit their 
work. If the experts' work is forced to carry on with only the passive 
acquiescence of the government--or worse, subtle attempts to hinder its 
work--rather than its active support, the progress that has been made 
may be lost and with it the truth and the Mexican Government's 
remaining credibility on this issue.
  The Mexican people, like people everywhere who care about human 
rights, deserve to know what happened to these students. As I 
mentioned, we also know there are thousands of other cases in Mexico of 
disappearances and many reports by the National Human Rights Commission 
and reputable human rights organizations of incidents of torture and 
extrajudicial killings. The only way to effectively address the kind of 
lawlessness that has become far too prevalent in Mexico is to conduct 
credible, thorough investigations and appropriately punish those 
responsible, so the message is clear that no one is above the law.

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