Ackerman Chronicle
October 7, 2019
Newsletter for the Ackerman Center for Holocaust Studies at UT Dallas
"Searching for the Disappeared"
The Disappeared
In 2006, the War on Drugs initiated an eruption of violence in Mexico that led to thousands of casualties, most of which remain missing from their families. Today, the number of victims and violence only continues to escalate. In just 2013, then 29-year-old businessman Luis Guillermo Lagunes Diaz became one of the disappeared when armed assailants abducted him from his home in Veracruz. His mother, Lucía Diaz, transformed her grief into activism in her search for her missing son and founded the organization, Colectivo Solecito de Veracruz. On October 7th, 2019, the Ackerman Center, in conjunction with the Center for U.S.-Latin America Initiatives at UT Dallas (CUSLAI), the Dallas Peace and Justice Center and the University of Dallas hosted the lecture event, “Searching for the Disappeared,” where Lucía Diaz (upper right) and researcher Dr. Matt Hone (below) discussed the purpose and history of the organization.
Dr. Hone outlined the history of the drug wars in Mexico and its impact on civilians, many who became victims. In 2006, President-elect Felipe Calderón deployed the military to combat the drug cartels. The brutal confrontation led the cartels to splinter, which escalated violence. Dr. Hone addressed several significant issues surrounding the lack of acknowledgment and realization of the violence in Mexico from the global community, citing issues such as internal corruption and inaccurate reports of victim statistics. The misleading numbers stem from several factors including families not reporting their missing out of fear of retaliation or shame due to a tendency to characterize the victim as participants in the drug trade despite their innocence. Inaccurate statistics also result from victims buried in mass graves or horribly disfigured who have yet to be discovered or identified.
For Diaz, the most heart wrenching aspect is how missing victims who remain unnamed lose their identities. She emphasized how this loss of personhood deprives families of closure. She encouraged advocacy to bring attention to the often-trivialized horrors happening in Mexico right now and reminded the audience about the responsibility of all humans to help each other to prevent atrocities.
Lucía Diaz’s son remains missing. She expressed how painful it felt to lose him and the realization that she was not alone in her grief: many other grief-stricken mothers also yearned to recover their lost children and this led her to form Colectivo Solecito de Veracruz. The members of her organization devote themselves to searching for the missing victims and reuniting them with their families. They also advocate and demonstrate against government inaction and corruption, hoping to bring about change.
Contact Colectivo Solecito de Veracruz
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Lucidige/
Twitter: @SolecitodeVer