U.N. asks Mexico to show its commitment to human rights

The United Nations said that Mexico's government must show its commitment to fight enforced disappearances with actions and not only with words, and solve the thousands of cases that exist in the country.

At a press conference, Ariel Dulitzky, chairperson of the UN's Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances, said that that "in recent weeks" there has been "a change of attitude in Mexico's government after the report submitted by the experts from the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights."

Nonetheless, Dulitzyky said that it is necessary that Mexico's government “acknowledges the dimension of the problem of enforced disappearances”, creates a genetic database, indicts those responsible for these crimes and pays reparations to the victims.

“These would be concrete steps in the right direction,” he explained.

Dulitzky added that no one knows for sure the number of missing people in Mexico.

The expert recalled that one of the main conclusions of the latest report of the Panel on Mexico was that there is "widespread impunity".

"In Mexico there is a pattern of widespread impunity that is very worrying, because Mexico is an established democracy," he added.

He added that the group supports the conclusions of the U.N. Committee on Enforced Disappearances that a year ago said that this crime is "generalized" in Mexico.

This is the same conclusion reached by the U.N. Rapporteur on Torture, Juan Méndez, who also said that ill-treatment in the country is "widespread".

Dulitzky said that the group also supports Méndez.

Therefore, he called for "a change of culture" in the government and above all, a change of attitude, in order to progress in the solution of cases.