Mexico confirms the rescue of 31 migrants kidnapped in a state bordering the US.

First modification: 03/01/2024 – 22:59Last modification: 03/01/2024 – 23:04

3 min

The Government of Mexico reported this Wednesday, January 3, of the rescue of 31 migrants who had been kidnapped by an armed group since last Saturday in the state of Tamaulipas, on the border with the United States.

No details were offered of which body or under what circumstances the rescue had been carried out or which of the irregular groups operating in the region was behind the kidnapping, carried out on Saturday and confirmed on Tuesday by the president of Mexico, Andrés Manuel López Obrador.

In the group there were migrants from Colombia, Venezuela, Honduras, Ecuador and Mexico, who were traveling on a bus on the Reynosa-Matamoros highway to attend their asylum appointment before US authorities in Brownsville, Texas (USA), and were intercepted by armed elements covered with balaclavas.

Of the initial group of 36, five Venezuelans were abandoned in one of the vehicles to which the kidnapped people were transferred, when the captors crossed paths with National Guard officers on Tuesday, and decided to flee the scene on foot.

Safe and sound

The spokesman for the Presidency of Mexico, Jesús Ramírez Cuevas, added that the 31 rescued were “in the hands of the authorities for the corresponding medical examination,” after having been released in the municipality of Río Bravo.

The news was also confirmed by the Secretary of the Interior, Luisa María Alcalde, who is in charge of the state's immigration policy and who added that the migrants were “safe and healthy.”

Security authorities had revealed this Wednesday that they were monitoring the cell phone signal of the kidnapped people, and analyzing the videos of the bus in which they were traveling, in addition to searching the area with trained dogs.

Meanwhile, Foreign Minister Alicia Bárcena remained in contact with the governments of the countries of origin of the affected migrants.

Common crime

The Secretary of Security and Citizen Protection, Rosa Icela Rodríguez, had referred to the mass kidnapping of migrants as an “atypical” event, despite the violence they suffer as they pass through Tamaulipas.

“This type of event occurred with one, two or three migrants, but this number in that area is atypical, it is not an issue that occurs frequently,” said the official.

His statements were rejected by the opposition presidential candidate Xóchitl Gálvez, who denounced the violence and insecurity on Mexico's roads.

“Traveling on the country's roads means risking your life. For example, the kidnapping of migrants traveling by bus in Tamaulipas. That is the reality that transporters, tourists, passenger trucks and merchants live in Mexico,” said Gálvez on the social network X.

An investigation by the Reuters agency revealed a pattern of kidnapping and sometimes sexual abuse of migrants in their transit to the United States.

Data from the consulting firm InSight Crime indicate that the kidnapping of migrants moves close to 20 million dollars each year in Mexico.

But not all cases are resolved with economic transactions. In 2019, a bus with 22 migrants on board was kidnapped while traveling on the San Fernando-Reynosa federal highway, and the whereabouts of the victims remain unknown.

Another motivation for such practices is to prevent migrants from ending up reinforcing rival cartels, which is why there have been cases in which detention occurs with the aim of eliminating them.

One of the most remembered related events in Mexico is the San Fernando massacre, in Tamaulipas.

In August 2010, a total of 72 migrants were murdered in San Fernando, Tamaulipas by organized crime for refusing to join their ranks. Justice determined that the Los Zetas cartel was the author of these events.

Of the 72 people, 58 were men and 14 women, from Brazil, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras and India.

With EFE and Reuters