An investigation has been opened for "homicide" in Mexico where eight people have been identified as allegedly responsible for the death of 39 migrants in a detention center of a federal institute in Ciudad Juarez on the doorstep of the United States, Mexican authorities said Wednesday (March 29th).

"None of the officials or private security police carried out any action to open the door to the migrants who were inside while there was fire," human rights prosecutor Sara Irene Herrerías Guerra told a news conference the day after the incident. An investigation has been opened for "homicide" and "injury", she added, without ruling out other offenses.

Eight suspected perpetrators have been identified, added Public Security Minister Rosa Icela Rodriguez. They are three agents of the National Institute of Migration (INM) and five members of a private security company, she detailed.

Four arrest warrants

At least four arrest warrants will be requested from the judges as early as Wednesday, the prosecutor said. The prosecutor confirmed the authenticity of a 32-second video broadcast by several media including AFP. "This video is part of the investigation file," she said.

These CCTV images show the beginning of the fire on the night of Monday to Tuesday. Behind bars, in the smoke, one man kicks against a closed door while another appears to be laying a mattress on the floor. In the foreground, on the other side of the cell, three officers, two of whom were in uniform, withdrew with their backs turned to them, without assisting them.

Es criminal. Así dejaron encerrados a los migrantes en la Estación de Ciudad Juárez, Chihuahua. pic.twitter.com/MwwMGi1cTl

— Joaquín López-Dóriga (@lopezdoriga) March 28, 2023

The Mexican president had assured Wednesday Tuesday that there would be "no impunity" in the tragedy of the detention center of Ciudad Juarez. "We are not going to hide anything and there is not going to be impunity," President Andrés Manuel Lopez Obrador said.

At first, the Mexican president had estimated that the migrants had lit the fire with mattresses in a "protest" movement. "We assume that they have learned that they are going to be deported, displaced," he said Tuesday hours after the tragedy, unprecedented in facilities for migrants in Mexico.

With AFP

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