MEXICO CITY.- More than 300 migrants were kidnapped in Mexico during 2023, according to data collected from official sources and human rights defenders. human rights.
In the state of Chihuaha, cases of kidnapping of 150 migrants, according to the entity’s Prosecutor’s Office, and in most cases the kidnappers asked the relatives for ransom. Due to these events, 32 files were opened in the Prosecutor’s Office, Millennium.com reported. The kidnappings were carried out by members of drug trafficking cartels.
The Chihuaha Prosecutor’s Office said that investigations were opened against 66 suspects involved for the crime of kidnapping for extortion. Of that number, 46 suspects have been prosecuted, of which 17 have been convicted. Nevertheless, State authorities recognize that there are dozens of cases that are not reported.
In most cases, kidnappings are carried out by drug trafficking cartels who take the victims to the United States illegally and then demand a ransom from their families.
Likewise, in San Luis de Potosí, 100 migrants were victims of kidnapping in 2023, who were treated by the authorities. In Coatzacoalcos, state of Veracruz, more than 30 migrants were treated in the shelters installed in that city. Several of these migrants had been victims of kidnapping, and were released after paying ransoms. The same situation occurred in Chiapas and Oaxaca.
“In the United States, their family and friends raise money for the amount they ask for to be rescued. Unfortunately, these cases have not been reported and occur in Veracruz. Most of them have spent up to a week in a place they do not know,” declared Guillermo Garduza, representative of the “Santa Faustina Kowalska” Migrant House, in San Luis de Potosí.
Garduza added that, in addition, he is aware that hundreds of migrants are assaulted on trains or on the roads.
Representatives of shelters in Coatzacoalcos say that from January to October 2023, they received 10 migrants who had been kidnapped in southern Mexico and who were released after their families paid a ransom.
“They keep them for a while and since they have family in the United States, and according to that they ask them for money to release them, and after several days they release them,” said Father Joel Ireta, representative of the Coatzacoalcos Migrant House, indicated Milenio.com.
In many cases, police officers are involved in crimes and extort migrants.
Veracruz is the state where the highest number of crimes against migrants are recorded, who come mostly from Honduras, Guatemala, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Ecuador, Venezuela and Panama.
Chiapas and Oaxaca have records that in Sonora and Tamaulipas dozens of Oaxacans have been kidnapped and some are still missing.
In the states of Chiapas and Oaxaca the situation with migrants is similar. In December, 17 migrants were kidnapped in Chiapas, and in Sonora and Tamaulipas the same thing happened with at least 30 migrants in five months.
Source: With information from Milenio
