Demand cutoff of U.S. military aid to Mexico

Minneapolis, MN – Forty students and community members gathered in front of Coffman Student Union at the University of Minnesota, Sept. 25, to mark one year since 43 Mexican student activists from the Ayotzinapa Rural Teachers College in Guerrero, México were forcibly disappeared at the hands of the Mexican government. A year later the students still have not been located.

The protesters at the University of Minnesota held posters with the names and pictures of the 43 disappeared Mexican students. As the emcee called out each missing student’s name, the protesters responded with a strong chant of “¡Presente!” The vigil was organized by the Minnesota Immigrant Rights Action Committee (MIRAC).

The Mexican government has still not carried out a credible investigation of what happened to the Ayotzinapa students. Their disappearance is not an isolated incident, just one particularly egregious example of thousands of such disappearances and brutal murders carried out with impunity in recent years in México. The rallying cry of the Ayotzinapa students’ families and the huge movement in Mexico and around the world supporting them is “Fue el estado!” (“It was the state!”), clearly putting the blame on the Mexican government’s corruption and impunity.

A statement read at the vigil called for an end to U.S. military aid to Mexico while the Mexican government flagrantly violates the rights of the Mexican people with impunity. The U.S. government is not a passive bystander to the systemic violence and corruption in Mexico, but rather provides institutional support for it. Washington has given massive funding – around $2.5 billion – to México through the Merida Initiative during the Obama administration. Washington also strongly backs right-wing Mexican president Enrique Peña Nieto’s efforts to privatize key sectors of the Mexican economy in the interest of multinational corporations and against the interests of the Mexican people, refusing to hold the Mexican president accountable for crimes committed against the people by the government, police and military.

#MinneapolisMN #Mexico #PeoplesStruggles #Ayotzinapa #Missing43Students #Americas