Armed personnel release video condemnation team looking for missing relatives at the scene of suspected cartel training camp

The masked and armed man radiated a video denouncing people’s search for missing relatives in cartel camps in Jalisco, western Mexico, as authorities say.

In a video circulating Monday night, a person stands on both sides of a person in the formation, reads a statement to identify it as a member Jalisco’s new generation cartel. He questioned the motives of the searchers, who said last week they found hundreds of clothes, Dozens of shoes and charred bones In a ranch outside Guadalajara.

The Attorney General’s Office, which is investigating the cartel scene, did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The Associated Press cannot independently confirm the person behind the video.

Safety analyst David Saucedo said Tuesday he has no doubts Jalisco Cartel This is done, citing its similarities to other videos that the authorities have associated with the group. Its purpose is to clean up the image of the cartel and to oppose negative publicity generated by a week’s exhaustive coverage.

Jalisco Cartel is one of the eight Latin American criminal organizations under the U.S. government Designated foreign terrorist organization last month.

As part of its public relations strategy, the cartel has produced and released similar videos. They often condemn their competitors and make themselves defenders of their people.

“It’s so subtle, and it’s anger that they try to get our name dirty,” said members of Jalisco Search Warriors, who are looking for missing relatives. She asked only her name Angélica to be safe.

“They are washing their hands and creating something they create,” she said, referring to the video’s denial, which is that the cartels are involved in forced recruitment or use the site for killing. “Where are the authorities? They didn’t come out to defend us or give their position.”

“No one protects us,” Angelica said. “We are scared out day after day… because the only thing we want to discover is where our children are.”

In Mexico, more than 120,000 people disappeared

The search team refused to identify criminal groups that might be responsible for what they said were camps as a concern for security. These groups are common throughout Mexico and often do not require judicial justice in relatives’ cases, but just strive to find them.

The ranch in Tchitland, about 37 miles west of Guadalajara, was originally discovered by the National Guard in September.

Authorities later said 10 people were arrested, two hostages were released, and bodies were found wrapped in plastic. The state attorney’s office brought backhoe, dog and equipment to spot inconsistencies on the ground.

But then, the investigation became quiet until members of Jalisco Search Fighters, one of dozens of search groups in Mexico, visited the site earlier this month.

They found shoes, and other clothes, which seemed to be burning pieces of bone.

Jalisco State Attorney El Salvador Gonzalez de Los Santos visited the ranch in person last week. He did not provide details on why investigators have failed to find what untrained private citizens have done before, but said previous efforts were “insufficient.” His office released photos of all the evidence, hoping that relatives could identify a piece of clothing.

According to government statistics, more than 120,000 people have disappeared in Mexico.

Several mass graves have been found in Mexico in recent months. At least in January 56 corpses were found In the unmarked mass graves of northern Mexico, not far from the U.S. border.

one Popular graves Dozens of bags of dismembered body parts contained the remains of 24 people were found in the suburbs of Guadalajara last December. In the same month, Mexican authorities said they took back the 31 corpse From Chipas, a country plagued by cartel violence.

A collective search for missing persons It says drug trafficking cartels and other organized criminal gangs sometimes use ovens to incinerate their victims without leaving any trace.

France-Pars-Pars contributed to this report.