MONTERREY, Mexico (Reuters) – Mexico is investigating whether any officials were involved in the alleged massacre of 19 people in the northeastern state of Tamaulipas after a truck allegedly seized by immigration authorities before the killings were found there. of the crime.
“Let’s see if there is any responsibility on the part of any official or employee of the National Institute of Migration itself,” said Mexico’s interior minister, Olga Sanchez, on Monday.
To date, public prosecutors have genetically identified two Guatemalans and two Mexicans among the 19 victims, whose bodies have been severely charred.
Some Guatemalan families fear that their loved ones trying to migrate to the United States are among those killed in Tamaulipas.
A truck found at the crime scene was seized by immigration authorities in the neighboring state of Nuevo Leon in December, local media reported.
The Nuevo Leon immigration institute did not respond to requests for comment on the truck seizure. The Nuevo Leon prosecutor’s office referred Reuters to the Tamaulipas prosecutor’s office, which on Saturday said the truck had been located at the site of a “rescue” of 66 foreigners by local police and immigration officials in December. The office said on Monday it could not confirm the immigration agency’s subsequent seizure of the truck.
Sanchez said the federal government was aware of the truck and the fact that it could be in the hands of immigration authorities, but said the matter was still under investigation.
The deaths caused renewed dismay in Mexico over the dangers faced by migrants, many of whom come from the three violent and impoverished Central American countries: Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador.
(Reporting by Laura Gottesdiener and Adriana Barrera, written by Laura Gottesdiener; Editing by Steve Orlofsky)
Originally published