DNA confirmation made on first of Mexico's 43 missing college students; leftist leader says PDR continues to harbor some of those responsible for Iguala massacre

Guadalajara -
Mexico's Procuraduría General de la República, the federal Attorney General's office, confirmed today that human remains found near a city trash dump in Cocula, Guerrero more than a month ago belong to one of the 43 missing college students who vanished from Iguala, Guerrero on Sept. 26.

The students were kidnapped by local police officers and handed over to executioners on the payroll of the Guerreros Unidos drug cartel, who killed them soon after. Their bodies were burned and later discarded in a river. All hope fades for families of 43 missing students, as Attorney General Karam delivers devastating news.

Identification was made from bone fragments recovered from the area, according to the PGR, which said it will hold a press conference tomorrow (Dec. 7). A webpage maintained by the victims' school, the Normal Rural de Ayotzinapa, reported the DNA match was confirmed by an Argentine forensic team which has been assisting Mexican authorities for many weeks.

Teeth and other incinerated remains were sent to forensic specialists at the University of Innsbruck, Austria last month, where testing continues.

Mexican prosecutors allege that the kidnappings and executions were carried out on the direct orders of Iguala's former left wing Democratic Revolution Party (PRD) mayor, José Luis Abarca Velázquez, and his wife, María de los Ángeles Pineda Villa.

Pineda, who planned to succeed her husband in office, was scheduled to deliver a political speech the night of Sept. 26. Abarca and Pineda feared that several busloads of students passing through Iguala, Guerrero's third largest city, intended to disrupt the event. The students' arrival about 9:00 p.m. had been reported to Abarca by corrupt officers known as halcones (hawks) working on the Guerreros Unidos payroll. The students attended a teachers' college with a long history of political dissent and at times violent street protests. Mexico's Guerrero state in extreme civil disorder.

The mayor directed local police to detain the missing students. Mexico's attorney general claims Abarca and Pineda have been "operators" for Guerreros Unidos since the former launched his first mayoral campaign in 2010, and has called Pineda the "principal operator." All of her brothers are alleged to be active in narcotics trafficking. Abarca and Pineda were arrested in Mexico City Nov. 4, and remain in federal custody facing murder and conspiracy charges. The Dancing Devils of Iguala.

Links between the Guerreros Unidos drug cartel and PRD have been a public relations nightmare for the party in recent weeks, prompting its famous founder, the voice of Mexico's mainstream Left, to quit. Cuauhtémoc Cárdenas resigned on Nov. 25, after saying that PRD had "lost its moral authority."

Much of Guerrero state government still remains under the control of local PRD officials.Family ties, nepotism suggest nothing has changed in Iguala. Today the leader of Mexico's National Democratic Left (IDN), a political action movement which includes in its ranks many PRD members, claimed that some of the "accomplices" in the Iguala killings are entrenched in key PRD posts in the state.

In October IDN national director René Bejarano accused mayor Abarca of having ordered the murder of another PRD politician in the state in 2013. Guerrero prosecutors agree, and plan to charge Abarca with kidnapping and homicide in at least 11 other cases. Alleged butcher of Iguala faces more murder charges.

Oct. 20 - Mexican priest: 43 college students were "burned alive"
Nov. 24 - Guerrero: "A toxic mix of cartels, gangs and guerrillas"

"We are Ayotzinapa. We demand justice." Forty-two other students have not yet been identified.

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