Mexico News: Mexican Police Rescue Over 100 Kidnapped Migrants Held Hostage
Mexican police have succeeded in rescuing over 100 migrants who had been kidnapped by a human trafficking gang near Mexico City.
Some of the migrants, according to local reports, had been held hostage for five weeks in a house located in Mexico state.
As reported by the BBC, the majority of the rescued migrants (a number which included around 14 children) were Central Americans. There were, however, people from India and Sri Lanka, numbering 23 and five, respectively.
It is believed the migrants had been trying to enter into the U.S. illegally when they were captured by a gang that, after seizing them, demanded a ransom from their families.
According to government officials, five human traffickers were arrested in the town of Axapusco after the raid, which took place on Wednesday. Close to 100 agents were working in the operation to rescue the victims.
Police stated they had been alerted to the situation by a Guatemalan man who had escaped from the house. This information has been questioned though, as some of the migrants have accused the Guatemalan man of being tied to the smugglers.
The head of Axapusco's security commission, Alfredo Morquecho, has stated that the migrants were, considering the circumstances of what they had just been through, in relatively good condition.
According to the newspaper El Universal, the gang had installed an electrified wire fence around the property to keep the migrants from escaping.
The Mexican government has stated that it will repatriate the migrants. Migrants attempting to enter the U.S. illegally via Mexico is a common and dangerous occurrence. Back in 2010, 72 migrants were killed in Tamaulipas state by the drug-trafficking cartel Los Zetas after their families had failed to pay the gang the demanded ransom.
Gang related kidnappings are typical in Mexico. As noted in Time, there were 1,583 kidnappings reported to the Mexican police in the first 11 months of 2013, which was a higher number of kidnappings reported than the whole of the previous year.
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