The Mexican army was aware “in real time” of the kidnapping and disappearance of 43 students from the Ayotzinapa Normal School in 2014, according to a document from the commission of inquiry released Tuesday. “The army was aware of what was happening” and the soldiers implicated in this affair “had real-time information on the possible destinations of the missing students”, states this document published by the Commission for the Truth ( COVAJ), set up by the government to investigate the matter.
These students from Ayotzinapa disappeared on the night of September 27, 2014 after going to Iguala, in the state of Guerrero (south), where they were preparing to board several buses to go to the capital Mexico and participate in a demonstration. According to official versions, they were kidnapped by the police, in collusion with criminals, and were delivered to the Guerreros Unidos cartel which allegedly murdered them.
The students were mistaken for members of a rival cartel
Interception of cartel communications by the US Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) indicates that the students were mistaken for members of a rival cartel and that the buses they had “commandeered” contained drugs, weapons or money, according to the government. According to the document published Tuesday, the Mexican army had followed the members of the armed group responsible for the crime with the complicity of the police.
In a previous report published on September 27, the Commission described the case as a “state crime”, emphasizing that the army had some responsibility, either directly or through negligence. Two generals, twenty other officers or privates, a former attorney general and some 120 other people are imprisoned in connection with this affair.