MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 23rd March, 2023) Nine police officers have been arrested in Mexico in connection with the disappearance of 43 students of the Ayotzinapa Rural Teachers' College in 2014, the Secretariat of Public Security of the State of Guerrero said on Thursday.
"The criminal investigation agency implemented the order to arrest seven state police officers and two police officers of the Iguala municipality, " the statement read.
In September 2014, 43 students of the Ayotzinapa Rural Teachers' College, known for its left-wing activism, disappeared after being intercepted by police on their way back home from Iguala, where they had taken part in protests against discriminatory hiring practices for teachers. Following clashes with the protesters, the police blocked the road the students were traveling in buses. They were reported missing soon after.
It turned out that the students had been kidnapped by the local police, handed over to bandits and then supposedly killed in different places. The analysis of the bone remains found during the search operation confirmed the identity of three of the missing students. Witnesses in the events and participants, as well as 26 key witnesses - members of criminal groups and their relatives - died or were killed during the investigation.
The country's interior ministry called the kidnapping of 2014 a state crime committed with the participation of the members of the Guerreros Unidos criminal gang, as well as the agents of a few Mexican state bodies. The investigation did not find anything indicating that the missing students could be alive. The Federal court ordered the arrest of 83 persons in connection with the case, including 20 commanders and soldiers of the Mexican army's 27th and 41st infantry battalions.
