When 43 college students in Guerrero, Mexico were heading to protest on the lack of funding for their school, they were captured by police and were believed to be handed over to a drug cartel. The students have been missing for about two months since that trip without any track of their destination. Recently, the police force announced that they had found a few of burned body parts that could possibly be the bodies of the victims, but are not 100% sure if they are, due to the difficulty of identifying them through DNA because of how damaged the bodies were found. After this announcement protests and riots have arose due to the people believing that the government took no action and this was the consequence.
The riots all started when the families of the students were asking too many questions and the government was not giving them answers. The people got frustrated and demanded the authorities to find their loved ones. Many of them aren’t just relatives of the victims but citizens of Guerrero that believe that the government is the reason why the students went missing, and want corruption to end.
Many of the riots are taking place in government official buildings all over Mexico. In the city of Chilpancingo, Guerrero rioters have gathered in a government building and burned a portrait of the governor of Guerrero and have set cars on fire just before the police and fire department arrived.
“An unfortunate event, sounds very injustice and unfair” said Naomi Yokota, a spanish teacher. She also said “I’m a person who believes in nonviolent demonstrations, protesting and physically showing up to places so people know you care can be one way to help. However if people are rioting, being violent, looting and taking advantage of people through the chaos, I wouldn’t support that”. Jonathan Morales, a senior high school student, said “ They should find the kids. I heard that they government is not searching and putting their time”. His opinion on the riots is that,“ They should not riot because it creates violent and looks bed even though its for a good cause. The people should not fight fire with fire because they will end up losing.”
The tragedy is still affecting a lot of people in Mexico. The riots are getting stronger and larger do to the due to the injustice the people believe of the government.
Sources:
- http://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-29609409
- http://www.cnn.com/2014/11/07/world/americas/mexico-missing-students/