Vol. 79/No. 11      March 30, 2015

On March 16 a delegation of 12, including family members of the 43 students, some of their classmates and human rights activists, began a speaking tour of the United States with meetings in San Antonio, El Paso and McAllen, Texas, to win solidarity and support for their fight to get out the truth.

Divided into three caravans — one each for the West Coast, East Coast and the South and Midwest — they will visit more than 40 U.S. cities over the next month.

“The 43 students are the face of the tens of thousands of disappeared in Mexico,” Julio César Guerrero, national coordinator of the caravans, told the Militant from San Antonio, March 17. “They are an illustration of the impunity and violence in Mexico.

“We are organizing this tour so the family members and students can speak their mind,” Guerrero said. “We have unions, students from the universities, people from the churches and even sympathetic politicians coming together.”

The students were attacked by the municipal police in Iguala, Mexico, on Sept. 26, 2014. Two were shot and killed by cops and masked gunmen that night and the tortured body of another student was found the next day. The police captured 43 of the students who have not been seen since. Three other people were killed by the cops: a bystander and two people traveling from a soccer game when the cops mistook their bus for one carrying the teaching students.

The Mexican government claims the case has been solved. They blame it all on the corrupt, drug-trafficker-infiltrated local governments and police forces of Iguala and the nearby town of Cocula who they say turned the 43 over to a drug gang, which killed them and burned their bodies. The government says they have arrested almost everyone involved. Case closed.

But classmates and families of the 43, as well as local human rights groups — with a well-founded skepticism about the government investigation — initiated protests, demanding, “You took them away alive, we want them back alive!”

They point to inconsistencies in the government’s explanations. They note that only one of the burned bodies has been confirmed to be a disappeared student. And they question the role of the army detachment posted in the area, which knew about the attack, but did nothing to stop it. On the contrary, the surviving students say, soldiers blocked students from getting medical help right after the police attack, telling them to “suck it up.”

The tour will conclude with the entire delegation coming to New York City in mid-April. Along with public meetings and demonstrations, caravan participants will be taking their fight to the United Nations, Amnesty International and the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights.

For more information on the tour visit www.caravana43.com.  
 
 
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