Forty Central American migrants are still missing somewhere in Mexico, and the authorities there might just have something to do with their abduction. The U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights has recently urged Mexico to look into the December abduction of forty migrants in the southern state of Oaxaca. Describing the circumstances of the migrants' disappearance as "highly questionable" Commissioner  Navi Pillay urged Mexico to ramp up its investigation.

The incident in question took place on December 16, when 250 migrants traveling north via freight train were stopped by police. Several migrants were detained by authorities, while others managed to continue their train ride northward. According to eyewitnesses, the train operator then demanded money from the migrants, and after being offered an apparently unacceptable sum, the operator warned of "trouble ahead."

A group of armed gunmen stopped the train a few miles up the tracks. They boarded the train, robbed and beat several migrants, and abducted 40 others. All while Mexican police plead innocent to the convenient timing of both incidents.

It is becoming increasingly clear that the Mexican government is ignoring a burgeoning crisis. Human rights activists in Mexico and around the world are now calling on Mexico to determine whether or not state officials, including those working for the government-operated train system, were complicit in this most recent assault on Central American migrants. But any clear-minded person can tell you that the sequence of events in this particular incident was no mind-boggling confluence of random events. This was a planned, coordinated and cold-blooded attack on vulnerable migrants, some of whom are still missing. The Mexican government cannot continue to ignore this crisis.

Photo credit: Hunter-Desportes