“Identification, now”: the claim of relatives of the disappeared in Mexico for the creation of a National Forensic Data Bank

Next August 30 marks the International Day of the Victims of Enforced Disappearances.

Search groups for the disappeared in Mexico and human rights organizations reinforced the campaign so that the Government fulfills its commitment to create a National Forensic Data Bank (BNDF), which would help reduce the number of more than 52,000 bodies that remain unidentified in the country.

Marches, symbolic closures and virtual activism under the slogan “Identification, now” are part of the actions that relatives are carrying out with a view to the International Day of the Victims of Enforced Disappearances, which will be commemorated on August 30.

The date is momentous in a country where, according to official figures, Until this Tuesday there were already 103,372 people missing or not locatedand where the humanitarian emergency has led to a forensic crisis that makes it impossible to identify all the bodies that are found.

Over the weekend, the National Network of Links, which brings together 160 groups throughout the country, family members and civil society organizations, symbolically closed the Attorney General’s Office, since it is the agency responsible for creating the BNDF.

According to the site Where the Disappeared Go, this body would help relatives deliver samples of genetic profiles to cross them massively and periodically with the information of deceased persons who have not been identified, and who are under the protection of the authorities. local prosecutors. Other data that would help identification are fingerprints, particular signs and clothing.

Before going to the Prosecutor’s Office, the groups met at the Glorieta de las and los Desaparecidos in Mexico, which is located on the central avenue Paseo de la Reforma, where they usually place photos of the relatives they are looking for and which is the subject of a controversy. constant, since on several occasions they have been withdrawn by the Government of Mexico City.

In fact, as part of this month’s activism, the relatives inaugurated the Postal Service of Memory, through which they will send letters to the head of government, Claudia Sheinbaum, asking her to accept that the Glorieta officially adopts the name of the disappeared.

Breach

The groups explained in a statement that the General Law on the Disappearance of Persons, published in November 2017, ordered the creation of various mechanisms to deal with the serious humanitarian crisis that the country has been facing since 2006, the year in which former President Felipe Calderón started a war against drug trafficking that only intensified the violence.

Among the objectives of this law is the creation and operation of a BNDF that concentrates forensic information for identification purposes, including genetics, and that takes into account data from the 32 states of the country.

The BNDF was supposed to operate from January 2019, however, it has not yet been created, hence the claim of relatives who know that this organization is essential to find their loved ones.

Until now, the Attorney General’s Office only has the genetic information of 15,000 of the more than 52,000 bodies that are unidentified due to the forensic crisis, that is, the human and technical inability to analyze the genetic samples of the victims. who still remain in the morgues as “unknown”.

The claim has already reached the Justice. Olimpia Montoya, who is looking for her brother Marco Antonio, who disappeared in Celaya, Guanajuato, in 2017, filed an amparo by denouncing that the lack of the BNDF violates her right to truth and access to justice. The Mexico City court handling the case is expected to issue its ruling in the coming weeks.

In addition, the Prosecutor’s Office has failed to comply with other commitments, such as the creation of the National Registry of Unidentified and Unclaimed Deceased Persons, the National Registry of Mass Graves and Clandestine Graves, and the National Program of Exhumations and Forensic Identification.