Cuban players at a game in Ciudad Obregón in August.
At least 11 members of the U-23 Cuban baseball team defected in Mexico before, during and after the World Cup in Sonora.
According to varying reports, 11 or 12 of 24 players abandoned the team, which finished fourth at the September 23-October 2 event held in Hermosillo and Ciudad Obregón.
It is one of Cuba’s largest defections in recent years and seen as a great embarrassment for the island nation. Mass defections of Cuban athletes were common during the 1990s when Cuba was in a so-called “special period” following the collapse of the Soviet Union but have been less frequent in more recent years.
Cuba’s National Institute of Sports, Physical Education and Recreation (INDER) excoriated the defectors, asserting they have “weak morals and ethics.”
“Is it so difficult to learn, from the cradle, that one doesn’t pursue dreams or personal projects by putting universal values such as commitment, responsibility and patriotism to one side?” INDER asked in its official magazine.
Cuban officials apportioned blame to the United States, noting that the U.S. has restrictions that force Cuban baseball players to defect in order to qualify to play in the major leagues. At least one young Cuban ballplayer, Luía Mejías, has already entered the United States, according to media reports.
Players who remain in Mexico could also seek asylum in the United States to pursue a professional baseball career. Their teammates who remain loyal to their homeland left Mexico on Monday.
Mayor Taboada of Benito Juárez offers defense of conservative citizens to counter president's criticisms.
The mayor of a Mexico City borough has defended the residents of one neighborhood he represents after President López Obrador declared that conservatism flourishes there.
Speaking at his regular news conference on Monday, López Obrador asserted that “there is more conservative thought in Colonia Del Valle than in Las Lomas.”
Del Valle is a middle class neighborhood on Mexico City’s south side while Las Lomas is an affluent district in the capital’s west side.
“[Conservative thought] is not exclusive to … [former president Felipe] Calderón … or [former president Vicente] Fox … or any other person. It’s not just them, there are millions who think like that in our country. … It’s a way of thinking and being, it’s conservatism … and they’re not a small group, there are 10 or 20 million of them. Conservative thought has always existed,” López Obrador said.
The president said that people who are conservative – a word he frequently uses to deride his critics – follow a “doctrine of hypocrisy” and are “not necessarily the richest” citizens of Mexico.
There is also conservatism in “sectors of the aspirational middle class,” he said before citing residents of Del Valle as an example.
Although there are millions of conservatives, the majority of Mexicans don’t agree with conservative thought, the president added, declaring that such thought is a synonym of selfishness, individualism, corruption, classism and racism.
In response to the president’s remarks, the mayor of Benito Juárez, the borough in which Del Valle is located, posted a video message to Twitter filmed in the neighborhood in question.
“Mr. President, don’t be mistaken, this neighborhood, like many in Mexico City, is aspirational and [the residents] are aspirational; they aspire to have better urban services, greater security, better work, better schools and quality health care. That’s legitimate aspiration and as a government we’re obliged to provide it,” said Santiago Taboada, who represents the conservative National Action Party.
He said that Del Valle residents enjoy “enviable” levels of human development – a remark supported by a United Nations report that found that Benito Juárez has higher levels of development than Switzerland – and that all Mexicans have the right to enjoy a similar quality of life.
Del Valle residents are “organized, informed and demand from authorities the quality of life to which they are entitled,” Taboada said.
“They’re also very critical of poor government decisions and they’ve always expressed that, [including] at every election. But above all Del Valle is a neighborhood of hard-working people. If getting up early every day to work to pay the rent, school fees or the market makes them conservative then I wish the country had more people like that,” he said.
“Mr. President, what really characterizes Colonia Del Valle is the generosity of its residents and never the selfishness you talk about,” the mayor said, citing humanitarian aid they provided for victims of Hurricane Grace and a powerful earthquake that struck the capital in 2017.
The coronavirus stoplight map that took effect on Monday.
Medium risk yellow is the dominant color on the federal government’s new coronavirus stoplight map, which took effect Monday.
There are 22 yellow states, nine low risk green states and just one high risk orange one – Baja California.
The biggest changes on the current map compared to that in effect for the past two weeks are the increase in the number of green states from four to nine and the decrease in the number of orange states from four to one. The number of yellow states declined from 24 to 22, while the number of maximum risk red states remains at zero.
The map reflects the improved coronavirus situation in Mexico after the third wave of the pandemic peaked in August. Reported case numbers declined 38% in September compared to August, although deaths decreased by just 1.3%.
Yellow states are:
Aguascalientes
Campeche
Coahuila
Colima
Guanajuato
Hidalgo
Jalisco
Mexico City
México state
Michoacán
Morelos
Nayarit
Nuevo León
Puebla
Querétaro
San Luis Potosí
Sonora
Tabasco
Tamaulipas
Tlaxcala
Veracruz
Yucatán
Painted green on the new map are:
Baja California Sur
Chiapas
Chihuahua
Durango
Guerrero
Oaxaca
Quintana Roo
Sinaloa
Zacatecas
Meanwhile, the Health Ministry reported 2,282 new confirmed coronavirus cases on Monday and 301 additional COVID-19 deaths.
Mexico’s accumulated case tally stands at 3.68 million while the official death toll is 279,104. There are 46,748 estimated active cases, a 25% decline compared to Friday.
Tabasco has the highest number of active cases on a per capita basis with about 130 per 100,000 people. Mexico City ranks second followed by Colima, Yucatán and Guanajuato.
More than 102.6 million vaccine doses have been administered, according to the most recent data. The Health Ministry said Sunday that 72% of the adult population has had at least one shot.
Despite the challenge of putting on large-scale events during a pandemic, Guanajuato’s wine and spirits competitions are carrying on with upcoming events like the Catando México wine competition on November 26–27 in Guanajuato city and the Concours Mondial de Bruxelles Mexico Selection competition for wines and spirits, starting November 29 in Mineral de Pozos. And a new pioneering competition, focusing on spirits, also made its debut in the state this year.
In August, the Guanajuato Spirits Competition brought together high-quality distillate makers from all over Mexico.
Particularly notable at this event was the performance of the country’s independent mezcal producers.
Diana Landin Campos, a Guanajuato native, and her husband José Antonio Castellanos Cardosa, who have promoted mezcal in the region for a combined 15 years, founded the pioneering event in the hopes of positioning mezcal as an important local product on the national and international level.
Thirty judges — including producers, professional tasters, sommeliers, and other experts drawn from all over Mexico — evaluated 800 brands of spirits during the two-day event, guided by criteria set by four of the country’s mezcal and spirit certifiers. Also in attendance was Abelina Cohetero Villegas, the current president of the Mexican Council for the Regulation of Mezcal (Comercam).
Women of Mezcal, a group of female mezcal producers across Mexico, hosts an event at the Guanajuato Spirits Competition.
Also of note, various chapters of the Mujeres del Mezcal (Women of Mezcal) participated in the event as both organizers and competitors, coming from places like Michoacán, Jalisco, Guerrero and Puebla. A new Guanajuato chapter of the association for Mexico’s female mezcal producers was formed at the event, promising commitment to the women producers, distributors, and marketers of mezcal.
Mezcal from every region, tequila, sotol, bacanora, charanda and other spirits with Destination of Origin competed at the event on a points system that considered each spirit’s look, nose, mouthfeel and the overall balance of its flavor. Each one- to three-minute tasting was blind, meaning that the judges had no idea which brand they were given.
When results were announced a week later, there were few surprises: during the tastings it was very obvious which products far outshone others. In the category of mezcals, Cata Decano from Michoacán, a gold medal winner, was truly delicious, sweet and herbal. Other winners included Designation of Origin gold medals for mezcals Mis Agaves (Aguascalientes) and La Querencia (Guerrero).
Personally, I was impressed with Finca Robles, a Oaxaca producer that for more than four years has positioned itself as a maker of one of the area’s best mezcals, with consistently good products. You can find their mezcal across the country and in the United States. In Mexico City, it’s available at the Mercado Roma in Roma and at the Mercado Roma and the Plaza Frida, both in Coyoacán.
Another standout was Paola Cisneros, a master distiller of Sotol Triple XXX, an incredible sotol made in Chihuahua that I recommend you try if you get the chance.
As a side note, Mexican gins also did well at the competition, with gold medals awarded in the spirits category, including Guanajuato’s Alicia brand, Solferino Native from Quintana Roo, Ginebra de Juanita of Jalisco, Bruja de Agua of Mexico City and Gin Maniobra, also of Jalisco.
Silver medal winner Finca Robles mezcal was one of the writer’s favorites at the competition.
Next year’s competition will surely be even better all-around for those of us fortunate to attend in 2022.
No drug traffickers, no cantinas in Simojovel, declares self-defense group.
Another self-defense force has emerged in the northeast of Chiapas.
Three months after the “El Machete” force was created in Pantelhó, the Armed Force of Simojovel has appeared in the neighboring municipality.
About 12 armed and masked members of the group appeared in a video posted to social media on Sunday.
“Today we have formed the armed group of the people with the aim of demanding respect for human rights. Out of respect we haven’t entered the town … but we’ll soon take action if our demands aren’t met,” said a spokesman for the group.
In a message directed to the incoming mayor of Simojovel and “the groups he heads,” the spokesman demanded respect for “our indigenous brothers” and an end to the embezzlement of the town’s resources.
He also said the self-defense group won’t allow the presence of drug traffickers or the operation of cantinas. In addition, he called for an end to murders in the streets of Simojovel and for “decent medical care for the people.”
“Public security should be for the people, not for the criminals,” the spokesman declared. “If these demands aren’t met, we’ll act against the bad municipal government.”
The orator also said that the armed group is an independent force and not affiliated with any political party.
The publication of the video coincided with the departure of Simojovel priest Marcelo Pérez Pérez, who officiated at his final mass on Saturday after spending 10 years in the town, located 90 kilometers north of San Cristóbal de las Casas.
Pérez was the subject of death threats, according to two bishops from the diocese of San Cristóbal.
“With surprise the news of death threats against the priest Marcelo Pérez Pérez reached us,” Rodrigo Aguilar Martínez and Luis Manuel López Alfaro said in a statement last month without specifying where the threat came from.
“People or groups that make threats against him or any … [priest] are threatening the church of Jesus Christ and this diocese.”
Mexican officials allege Genaro García Luna was the 'principal architect' of a vast money laundering empire.
Evidence and accusations are piling up against Mexico’s former top security official, Genaro García Luna, as U.S. prosecutors proffer new records in their case alleging he pocketed bribes from drug traffickers and Mexico demands the return of millions of alleged illegal assets.
In a September 29 filing in a New York federal court, prosecutors said they would provide García’s defense lawyers with new evidence to be used in the trial against him, including Mexican government documents, U.S. State Department records, photos and bank records. García, who served as Mexico’s minister of public security from 2006 to 2012 under then-president Felipe Calderón, is accused of accepting multimillion-dollar bribes from the Sinaloa Cartel in exchange for letting the group traffic multi-ton loads of cocaine into the United States.
The filing comes a little more than a week after Mexico’s Financial Intelligence Unit (UIF) announced its “first civil lawsuit abroad to recover assets related to illegal financial operations carried out by Genaro García Luna.”
After leaving office, García — along with a former high-ranking Mexican government official, several business associates, a network of companies and his wife — illegally obtained at least $250 million from the Mexican government between 2012 and 2018 through a “complicated unlawful government-contracting scheme,” officials alleged in the lawsuit filed in a Florida court on September 21. Those funds were then allegedly transferred out of Mexico using an “extensive” network in order to “hide the stolen funds in numerous assets” located in the United States.
US authorities arrested García in the state of Texas in December 2019 on cocaine trafficking conspiracy charges and making false statements. He pleaded not guilty to the charges last year.
Shortly after his arrest, UIF head Santiago Nieto filed two complaints against García with anti-corruption prosecutors in Mexico. The agency alleged he used tax havens around the world – including the United States, Barbados and Hong Kong – to conceal more than $50 million in bribes he is suspected of accepting from drug traffickers.
InSight Crime analysis
As the evidence in García’s drug case mounts, the latest allegations levied by the Mexican government point at suspected criminal activity exceeding what occurred during his time as a security official.
While U.S. prosecutors allege García used his role atop Mexico’s security forces to act as a key conduit for one of Latin America’s most powerful organized crime groups, Mexican officials said his misconduct extended to being the “principal architect” and one of the “ultimate beneficiaries” of a vast “money laundering empire” they dubbed “the Enterprise.”
Through suspected bribery, bid tampering and corruption in Mexico, officials allege he “used his influence with the Mexican government to override Mexican government contract and bidding procedures, and to ensure selection of his co-conspirators for multiple government contracts,” according to the lawsuit.
Between 2015 and 2019, Mexican authorities identified at least 30 transfers totaling hundreds of thousands of dollars of allegedly stolen government funds deposited by the network into accounts in the United States that were then routed to accounts in Barbados. All of those accounts, according to the complaint, were supposedly controlled by García and his associates.
What’s more, the group engaged in additional racketeering activity by using the stolen funds to manage and maintain the money laundering network through “international wire transfers, property tax payments, fee payments, and other payments to maintain, upkeep, and manage the Enterprise,” officials said.
García was never charged with any wrongdoing in Mexico during or immediately after his time as a top security official. Only after almost a year of being detained in the United States did Mexican authorities even issue an arrest warrant for him on illicit enrichment charges.
The scale of alleged corruption, if proven, is not only egregious – it is shocking for a man once entrusted with designing and executing Mexico’s assault on organized crime and drug trafficking.
Reprinted from InSight Crime. Parker Asmann is a writer with InSight Crime, a foundation dedicated to the study of organized crime.
Claressa Shields, left, and Abigail Montes at the PFL championship press conference in Hollywood, Florida. Professional Fighters League
Guadalajara’s Abigail Montes is only two fights into her mixed martial arts (MMA) career, but she’s already preparing for the kind of monumental challenge typically reserved for experienced pros. On October 27, the 21-year-old will step into the Professional Fighters League (PFL) cage for a showdown with Claressa Shields.
Shields, for those unfamiliar, is widely considered the greatest female boxer alive today, with two Olympic gold medals and an expansive collection of championship belts crowding her trophy case. The unbeaten boxing star announced her plans to transition into MMA last year and, in June, shut the lights out on Brittney Elkins in her debut.
Montes will serve as Shields’ second opponent in MMA. If the Mexican fighter is daunted by the challenge ahead, she’s hiding it well.
“I’m very confident heading into this fight,” Montes told Mexico News Daily during a recent visit to Fort Lauderdale, Florida. “I’m ecstatic to get such a big opportunity. I’m at my mental and physical peak and getting such a big fight is the perfect opportunity for me to seize.”
Montes started learning MMA when she was 14, encouraged by her mother, and inspired by her brother, who is also a professional fighter.
“My mom put me in classes when I was 14,” Montes recounted. “She wanted me to learn some kind of self defense because I was a girl. I ended up falling in love with mixed martial arts and training.
“My brother was also a fighter,” she added. “Eventually it became something that I pursued too, and I became a professional.”
In the years since her training began, Montes has honed a versatile skillset that will serve her well as her career continues. Against Shields, however, she’ll need to exercise extreme caution for every second of the fight.
The American will only need to land one good punch to win.
Montes is well aware of the danger ahead. While her best course of action would seemingly be to drag the fight to the ground, where Shields’ boxing skill will be all but useless, the Mexican says she’s preparing for every scenario.
“Her boxing is world-class, and I know she’s going to be dangerous standing up,” Montes said. “But we have a strategy going into this fight. I’m going to be prepared for everything she throws at me.
Abigail Montes says she has ‘Mexican heart.’
“In [MMA], the fight can go anywhere from standing to grappling,” she added. “We’re going into the fight very prepared for the striking and the grappling department.”
Needless to say, Montes is confident in her skills. Yet she also believes she’ll be able to lean on some of the traits frequently associated with Mexican fighters: intangibles like grit and heart.
“The ability for Mexican fighters to go into a ring or a cage and leave everything in there, 100%, I have that in me,” Montes said. “[The toughness] is just the cherry on top. I’m very confident in my boxing, my striking, my wrestling, my jiu jitsu. The additional toughness and grit to leave everything in the cage, the Mexican heart, those are just the bonuses that come with my skillset.”
If Montes’ skill and heart carry her to an upset victory over Shields, she can look forward to more huge opportunities inside the PFL cage.
The PFL presents MMA in a unique, seasonal format, with playoffs, finals and US $1 million in prizes for the champions of each weight division. Montes didn’t compete in the league’s 2021 season, but she’s hoping a win over Shields will be her ticket into 2022.
“Absolutely, that’s what I’m looking forward to following this fight,” Montes said when asked about competing in the 2022 season.
The PFL’s 155-pound women’s division — the division Montes calls home — has been the domain of Kayla Harrison since its inception. The American, a two-time Olympic gold medalist in judo, has won all 11 of her fights in the PFL cage — a streak that has turned her into one of the most intimidating figures in MMA.
If Montes joins the 2022 season, she anticipates a meeting with Harrison and believes that, with the right game plan, she can usurp the dominant American’s throne.
“I don’t like to look ahead,” she said. “I like to focus on the next challenge, which is Claressa. Eventually I’m sure [Harrison and I] will square off. When that time comes, my team and I will dissect her game and we’ll approach the fight with the best strategy.”
As Montes implies, looking past Shields would be a grave error. Her spot in the 2022 season and a potential fight with Kayla Harrison both seem to hinge on her beating the boxing champ. She believes she’s well positioned to accomplish that feat.
“I visualize the moment of victory often,” she said. “I foresee a potential ground-and-pound or submission victory.”
The International Consortium of Investigative Journalists calls the Pandora Papers the largest investigation in journalism history.
Political figures and members of their families are among more than 3,000 Mexicans who appear in the Pandora Papers, the biggest ever trove of leaked data exposing tax haven secrecy.
The International Consortium of Investigative Journalists obtained more than 11.9 million confidential files and led a team of more than 600 journalists from 150 news outlets who spent two years sifting through them. Many of their findings were published Sunday.
Journalists from four media outlets contributed to reports that focused on Mexicans who shifted some of their wealth to tax havens such as the Bahamas, Belize, the British Virgin Islands, Panama and the U.S. state of Delaware.
A report published by Quinto Elemento Lab said journalists from that investigative news website as well as news magagine Proceso, the newspaper El País and the broadcaster Univisión reviewed the Pandora Papers over a period of many months and found that 3,047 Mexicans or residents of Mexico have interests in almost 2,000 “hard to trace” offshore companies, trusts and foundations located in 22 different jurisdictions.
Among them are more than 80 people who are political figures or members of their families.
The president’s former legal counsel, Julio Scherer, has an interest in a US $1.5-million Miami apartment.
“The Pandora Papers investigation discovers that Mexicans have created shell companies to buy luxurious properties, private jets and yachts, to pay less tax, to manage fortunes and inheritances, … to manage investments, open bank accounts and to put aside profits from their businesses,” the Quinto Elemento Lab report said.
Transferring wealth into offshore entities is not a crime in itself, the report said. However, “in many cases their opacity allows the commission of crimes such as money laundering, corruption and tax evasion.”
“In Mexico it is not illegal to have front companies to … store wealth outside the country … but the use of offshore companies can be particularly controversial in the case of politicians and public officials because they can use them to hide money and assets from bribes or the diversion of public resources. This is of particular interest in nations such as Mexico where corruption is rampant and the government has done a bad job preventing these abuses,” the report said.
“… Twenty of the 80 politicians and families who appear in the Pandora Papers moved in recent decades about US $30 million to jurisdictions that offer tax privileges.”
The political figures/family members named in the report are:
Julio Scherer Ibarra, President López Obrador’s former legal counsel.
Jorge Arganis Díaz Leal, federal communications and transportation minister.
Armando Guadiana Tijerina, a federal senator for the ruling Morena party.
Julia Elena Abdala Lemus, a businesswoman and partner of Federal Electricity Commission (CFE) chief Manuel Bartlett.
Enrique Martinez y Martinez, former Institutional Revolutionary (PRI) governor of Coahuila and an ex-federal agriculture minister.
Arturo Montiel Yañez, son of former PRI governor of México state Arturo Montiel Rojas.
Jesús Murillo Ortega, son of former PRI governor of Hidalgo and ex-attorney general Jesús Murillo Karam.
Francisco Labastida Gómez de la Torre, son of former PRI governor of Sinaloa and ex-interior minister Francisco Labastida Ochoa.
Marcelo and Carlos de los Santos, sons of former National Action Party governor of San Luis Potosí Jesús Marcelo de los Santos Fraga.
Fernanda Castillo Cuevas, wife of current PRI governor of México state Alfredo del Mazo.
Paulina Díaz Ordaz, granddaughter of former president Gustavo Díaz Ordaz and wife of Green party politician Jesús Sesma.
Juan Ignacio García Zalvidea, a former federal deputy and mayor of Cancún.
Other people partially identified but not named include the Coahuila government secretary, the head of the office of Morelos Governor Cuahtémoc Blanco and the brother of a former governor of Yucatán.
Scherer, who resigned as the president’s legal adviser last month, is a large shareholder in a company domiciled in the British Virgin Islands that controls another company that owns a US $1.5 million apartment in Miami, the Quinta Elemento Lab report said.
He told the investigative journalists he has always acted in accordance with the law and would continue to do so.
The journalists determined that the other political figures had interests in companies, trusts or other entities in jurisdictions including the British Virgin Islands, the Bahamas and Panama.
Arganis, who became communications and transportation minister last year, denied any wrongdoing and asserted that he had in fact lost money he invested because he was defrauded. He invested 3 million pesos (US $146,000) in a Ponzi scheme run by Texan financier Allen Stanford, who was convicted of fraud and sentenced in 2012 to 110 years in jail.
Senator Armando Guadiana said he lost money in his offshore investment.
Senator Guadiana also said he had lost money via a trust apparently set up to fund a coal mine project in Colombia.
Abdala, who owns 10,000 shares in a Panamanian shell company, didn’t respond to requests for comment. Her husband, a former interior minister and governor of Puebla, has been accused of corruption but the Ministry of Public Administration determined that the current CFE director has no case to answer.
The total number of Mexicans and Mexico residents who appear in the Pandora Papers is 10 times higher than the number who appear in the Panama Papers, a similar trove of more than 11 million documents published in 2016.
President López Obrador said Monday he was in favor of Mexicans named in the Pandora Papers being investigated. The government’s Financial Intelligence Unit said Sunday it had launched an investigation in light of their publication.
The president addresses a noisy crowd in Puebla on Sunday.
A group of some 300 disgruntled hurricane victims forced their way into a meeting presided over by President López Obrador in Puebla on Sunday.
Hurricane Grace victims from Puebla, Tlaxcala, Veracruz and Hidalgo who say they weren’t counted by a government census that identified people affected by the storm passed through four security filters before bursting into an auditorium where López Obrador was providing an update on the delivery of assistance to victims.
Video footage shows rowdy and chaotic scenes inside the auditorium in Huauchinango where some hurricane victims approached the president.
After managing to calm the angry citizens, López Obrador assured them that financial aid and domestic appliances will be distributed directly to victims of Grace, which slammed into the Veracruz coast as a Category 3 hurricane on August 21.
“Everything will be delivered directly, without intermediaries,” he said. “… The Ministry of Defense will deliver [the aid] and we’re working in a coordinated way with the state government of Puebla,” López Obrador said.
The president left the auditorium shortly after it was overrun, leaving Security Minister Rosa Icela Rodríguez and Welfare Minister Javier May to deal with the victims. He was swamped as he made his way out despite being flanked by military personnel.
It’s not the first time that López Obrador’s security has been breached in Huauchinango. A young man stormed the stage while the president was speaking at an event in the city in January 2019.
At an event in Tlaxcala later on Sunday, López Obrador attributed the latest security breach to people’s desire to get up close and personal with him and other government officials.
“The people want to see us now, they want us to listen to them directly, and they want to participate. They no longer want everything to be through the internet or television,” he said.
A day earlier in Veracruz, the president acknowledged there were complaints about the process to assess the damage caused by Grace.
“There is, of course, some dissent, … there are those who say ‘I wasn’t included in the census’ or ‘they didn’t take me into account,’” he said, adding that they must be assisted if they are found to be genuine victims.
“All of us have to act with honesty, no lies,” López Obrador said. He also said that more than 45,000 households have already received 35,000 pesos (US $1,700) each.
Residents of at least 87 communities in Veracruz are among those who say they weren’t visited by the government employees who conducted the census. They include people who live in Huayacocotla, a municipality that borders Hidalgo in the state’s northwest.
“We’re demanding that the servants of the nation [as the census officials are known] be audited because they didn’t do their job well,” said Marina Martínez, a representative of the Zapatista Farmers Union, which represents the Huayacocotla residents.
“There are people who were affected [by the hurricane] but were not included in the census; they [only] registered those they wanted to, … they were selective,” she said, repeating complaints that have been made by victims of other disasters that have occurred during the term of the current government.
Texts were intercepted between Gildardo López, shown here during his arrest in 2015, and a police official in Iguala.
At least 38 of 43 students who disappeared in Iguala, Guerrero, seven years ago were handed over to a crime gang by municipal police, intercepted text messages indicate.
The federal Interior Ministry (SEGOB) released a document Friday that includes a transcript of a text conversation between Gildardo López Astudillo, who was allegedly the Guerreros Unidos plaza chief in Iguala at the time of the Ayotzinapa students’ disappearance, and Francisco Salgado Valladares, who was the deputy chief of the Iguala municipal police.
On September 26, 2014 – the day the young men disappeared – the latter tells the former that police have arrested two groups of armed and masked students.
López – identified by his nickname “Gil” in the transcript of the conversation intercepted by the army – tells Salgado to give him some of the students on the road to Pueblo Viejo, a community near Iguala.
He also says he has “some beds to terrorize them,” apparently revealing an intention to torture the students if not kill them.
Salgado tells López he will hand over a group of 21 students being held in a bus so that the Guerreros Unidos can “beat the living daylights out of them.”
The police commander then reveals that a second group of 17 students is being held in a “cave.”
“Give me all the detainees,” responds López. “Send enough people to the Brecha de Lobos [Wolf’s Gap], 17 are going there,” says Salgado.
Later in the conversation, Salgado advises López to tell “Gordo” (Fatty) to stop other students traveling in “more buses.”
He also says that “all the packages were delivered” – an apparent reference to shipments of drugs.
The text conversation supports part of the previous government’s official version of events about what happened to the 43 Ayotzinapa students on September 26, 2014.
An Ayotzinapa protest in Mexico City two years ago.
According to its so-called “historical truth,” the students, traveling on a bus they commandeered to go to a protest in Mexico City, were intercepted by corrupt municipal police who handed them over to members of the Guerreros Unidos crime gang who subsequently killed them, burned their bodies in a dump in the municipality of Cocula and disposed of their remains in a nearby river.
The federal government has rejected the “historical truth,” but despite launching a new investigation shortly after it took office in late 2018 has not divulged its own definitive version of events.
One theory is that heroin was hidden on the commandeered buses and the students were mistaken for members of a rival gang.
The federal Attorney General’s office (FGR) has taken statements from at least 30 soldiers since the current government took office but their testimony was heavily redacted in a document recently released by the FGR.
In another text conversation intercepted by the army in October 2014, presumed Guerreros Unidos member Alejandro “El Cholo” Palacios asks a person believed to be a municipal police officer in Tepecoacuilco – which borders Iguala – whether he was aware that all of López’s “graves” had been found.
“Yes, I’m seeing that,” responds the presumed police officer, identified only as Ramón N. in the SEGOB document.
“But don’t you think there is some kind of agreement?” the man asks Palacios, suggesting that López and local authorities might have colluded to hide bodies that were uncovered.
Iñaki Blanco, attorney general of Guerrero at the time of the students’ disappearance, said in a recent interview that the FGR and the Ayotzinapa truth commission should once again conduct a search in Pueblo Viejo and the surrounding area. He also said it’s very likely there are more intercepted text conversations that could shed light on what happened on September 26 and 27, 2014.
“If that is the case they will be useful to establish whether there were links between authorities and members of organized crime or not,” Blanco said.
Meanwhile, parents of the missing 43 – the remains of whom just three have been found – said that authorities’ dissemination of sensitive information about the case is risky because it could compromise the government’s ongoing investigation.
In addition, the parents complained that they neither they nor their lawyers were given access to official documents prior to their release. A committee to which they belong also said the army has withheld real time information it gathered during the abduction of the 43 students.
Not sharing that information violates a presidential decree that obliges the army to tell the Ayotzinapa truth commission what it knows about the case, they parents said.
“These circumstances strengthen our demand for an exhaustive investigation against members of the Mexican army to be opened in order to define their direct or indirect responsibility in the disappearance of our sons,” the committee said.
The parents also called on the federal government to publicly divulge all the information it has about their sons’ disappearance, asserting that drip-feeding the details only exacerbates their pain.
