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A team of independent investigators, probing the disappearance and alleged killing of 43 college students at the hands of criminal gangs in 2014 in Mexico, is set to dispute the government's account of what happened, reports said Friday.
[...] The international panel faced a sustained campaign of harassment, stonewalling and intimidation, The New York Times reported. The panel of experts alleged that the investigators endured planned attacks from Mexican news media and a refusal by the government to turn over documents or grant interviews with essential figures.
[...] The Mexican government had earlier concluded that the 43 students, who were in the city of Iguala in southwestern Mexico as part of a protest, were kidnapped by police officers working for criminal gangs, who then killed and incinerated them in a garbage dump of a nearby town.
The attorney general, who led the government probe, reportedly called the office's finding the "historic truth."
The independent investigators have opposed this version and maintained that the government's account of the events was based in part on confessions apparently extracted by torture. The panel also dismissed the theory that the students were burnt beyond identification at a rubbish dump as physically impossible.
Source: The International Business Times
(Score: 3, Insightful) by tangomargarine on Monday April 25 2016, @02:22PM
Wait, they *admitted* that they were kidnapped, killed, and the bodies disposed of with corrupt cops involved?
I have a hard time imagining what could be a worse revelation than this, other than the government directly executing them themselves. Barring that, why *wouldn't* they want to cooperate with the investigation?
...
A link [wikipedia.org] to information about the actual thing would've been nice, too. So wait...from the summary I had assumed these were U.S. students we were talking about. They're just random Mexican citizens? Why is the U.S. even involved in this?
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 3, Touché) by maxwell demon on Monday April 25 2016, @03:27PM
Maybe instead of simply being corrupt cops, they were cops following orders of their higher-ups. Of course the higher-ups have no interest in being found out to be involved.
Why do you think the U.S. is involved in this?
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Monday April 25 2016, @04:08PM
In September 2015, the results of a six-month investigation by a panel of experts assembled by the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights became known to the public.
The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights [...] is an autonomous organ of the Organization of American States (OAS).
Along with the Inter-American Court of Human Rights, it is one of the bodies that comprise the inter-American system for the promotion and protection of human rights.
The IACHR is a permanent body, with headquarters in Washington, D.C., United States
So it's headquartered in the U.S., at least. I guess I'm in "shit sucks down there but why should I care per se" mode.
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Monday April 25 2016, @05:25PM
Well to quote from your quote with emphasis:
The International Court of Justice is located in The Hague. Does that mean the Netherlands are involved in all its actions?
The headquarters of the International Atomic Energy Agency is in Vienna. Does that mean Austria is involved in all its actions?
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Monday April 25 2016, @06:08PM
Okay fine, you got me :)
Although I don't think it's an unreasonable assumption to make that the U.S. would be heavily involved in any international organization that has "American" in its name.
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 1) by Arik on Monday April 25 2016, @07:38PM
:facedesk:
The saddest thing is I know most usamericans would agree with you. I don't know what to call it, ethnocentrism? provincialism? myopathy? hubris? simply ignorance? at a shocking scale.
American as an adjective indicates something or someone from the Americas. There are two of them. And the USA is only part of one of them. Look at a damn map.
If laughter is the best medicine, who are the best doctors?
(Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Monday April 25 2016, @08:01PM
Yes I'm quite aware of that. What's your point?
Cf. the Monroe doctrine [wikipedia.org]. I may not be in favor of it but it's a historical fact.
If you look back through my posting history both here and the green site you'll see that I'm careful to refer to people as U.S. citizens, not "Americans," even though that's the generally-used term. I stand by every word of the phrasing I used in my post.
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 1) by Arik on Monday April 25 2016, @08:31PM
If laughter is the best medicine, who are the best doctors?
(Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Monday April 25 2016, @09:00PM
Did you read this comment tree?
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 25 2016, @05:30PM
Yes, the government admitted the involvement of corrupt cops, blamed the local mayor, and the governor of that state, jailed the mayor, removed the governor by making him resign, and all of this was possible because the mayor and the governor were from a different party from the ruling one, so the new governor is from the ruling party. The political implications involved in this case if it's demonstrated that the federal government was involved would seriously undermine the ruling party power.
Now about the students, they weren't regular students, but students from a specialized rural school that educates them to become teachers, some of this schools are involved in some highly political movements closely related to the unions that control every teacher and employee in public education, this powerful unions even created their own political party that is used to support another party trough political alliances. They are used as shock groups to pressure to the mayors and governors in turn from the political party or politician that handles them, trough the use of protests against or supporting some legal reforms, politicians, movements or simply to demand aid and support to their schools, some schools are more radical than others, and while I don't know much about the school (Ayotzinapa) from were the missing students are, but the one in the state I live (Michoacan) are extremely troublesome, kidnapping buses and trucks (sometimes burning them) on the road next to their town every other week, blocking the exit from the state capitol frequently and doing lots of vandalic acts during their protests, and generally making sure to cause lots of trouble to the governor and the people in the state. Of course that they stop immediately once their demands are satisfied so the school receives lots of economical support, to and absurd level, some of the benefits this school in particular gets are multiple scholarships for every student (food, transportation, school supplies, etc.), direct economical support (minimum daily wage for every student all year long, for as long they are students), and a guaranteed job as unionized teachers once they finish their "studies", which is outrageous since the minimum grade the teachers can apply to the students it's a passing grade no matter what (6 out of 10, most of the times the teachers just give everyone good grades), and to finish this all the Public Education Secretary still has to give them a year and a half training course to cover all they didn't learn at school, all expenses paid by the state. If you want to know some the stuff they do search google news for this school's town name: Tiripetio.
If you wonder how I learned all of this, my brother was a member of the student council for a year at the public university he attended and had to assist to discussions between schools representatives and public education secretary about scholarships, budgets and stuff, and he always came back to home completely shocked at all he saw and learned from the Tiripetio's representatives.
I think the one from Ayotzinapa were a less troublesome that the ones from Tiripetio, but I can't tell certainly.
TL,DR: they weren't random citizens, and if the Federal Goverment it's involved in the dissapearance the political implications are huge for the ruling party so they don't want somebody else to mess with their "historical truth" (the official version).