‘Alarming’ Disappearance Crisis in Mexico: Report Accuses State of Deep Involvement

The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) has released a damning report warning that the disappearance crisis in Mexico is at an “alarming” level, with active participation by state actors. The report, obtained exclusively by The Guardian, paints a grim picture of a catastrophe where over 130,000 people have vanished, most of them in the past two decades since the government declared war on drug cartels.

Although criminal gangs bear much of the responsibility, the IACHR found that many disappearances occur amid “extensive and coordinated collusion” with state agents. In some regions, the number of disappearances carried out by government officials is nearly equal to that of criminals. The report also documents an “alarming” number of cases involving torture and enforced disappearances at the hands of security forces.

Enforced disappearance — when a person is detained, extrajudicially executed by the state, and their body disposed of — has a long history in Mexico, dating back to the “dirty war” of the 1960s-70s. Recently, organized crime has adopted these tactics to sow terror, burning bodies, burying them in mass graves, or dissolving them in acid. Over the past decade, the number of disappearances has surged by more than 200%.

The report stresses that state agencies often participate directly (arresting people without warrants, handing them over to criminals) or indirectly (turning a blind eye). The IACHR also found that “organized crime in Mexico recruits state agents responsible for security, law enforcement, and even local governments.”

Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum has repeatedly dismissed such allegations. When the United Nations last year suggested there was evidence of widespread enforced disappearances, she declared: “There are no state-enforced disappearances in Mexico.” Last month, when the UN argued that the disappearances could constitute crimes against humanity, the Mexican government reacted sharply, calling the report “biased and condescending.”

Activists say this is an attempt to downplay the severity. In March, the government released a report claiming that a third of disappearance cases lack data, effectively classifying about 40,000 missing people as “abandoned.” Maria Luisa Aguilar, head of the human rights center Centro Prodh, said: “They are trying to minimize the scale of the problem and shift responsibility onto families.”

The IACHR noted that families are organizing search parties to find their loved ones, facing institutional challenges and danger. Since 2010, at least 27 people searching for the missing have been murdered, most of them mothers. The report describes disappearances as “affecting entire families, many of whom have lost all their relatives.”

The IACHR acknowledged that the Mexican government has taken steps, such as reactivating a National Search Commission and recognizing a humanitarian crisis. However, a weak legal system falls short. “Impunity in Mexico is an insurmountable problem,” the IACHR said. Since 2014, only 357 people have been charged for disappearances, and of those, just nine have been convicted. Some 70,000 bodies remain unidentified in state custody. “These numbers are overwhelming,” Aguilar concluded.