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Mothers and grandmothers of six missing Cubans arrived this Monday in Chiapas, Mexico, to start a search brigade for their relatives, according to the alternative media outlet Desinformémonos.
Seventeen months have passed since the last contact on December 21, 2024, when the young people called from San José Hueyate, Chiapas, to say that the coyotes would transfer them by boat to Juchitán de Zaragoza, Oaxaca. That transfer never took place.
The families come from Matanzas, Havana, Camagüey, and Santiago de Cuba. It is the first time these women have left the island, and they arrived with one certainty: "they do not intend to rest for a single minute until they find them."
Among the Cubans identified in the group that boarded the vessels that day were Elianis de la Caridad Morejón Pérez, aged 18 to 19; Dairanis Tan Ramos, 33; Jorge Alejandro Lozada Santos, 24; Meiling Álvarez Bravo, 40, and her son Samei Armando Reyes Álvarez, 14; Lorena Rozabal Guevara, 28; and Ricardo Hernández, 33.
The missing group consisted of approximately 40 migrants from Cuba, Honduras, and Ecuador who boarded two boats from San José El Hueyate, in the municipality of Mazatán. The GPS signal of the vessels was lost at 8:25 a.m. in the Pacific Ocean, just a few meters from the coast. Before embarking, several sent messages to their families: “We don’t know how to swim,” “they are giving us life jackets,” “there are gunshots nearby.”
Migrants had paid between $8,000 and $10,000 for the promised journey to Mexico City, a route controlled by the Jalisco New Generation Cartel (CJNG). San José El Hueyate has become the epicenter of mass disappearances, between September and December 2024, at least three incidents were recorded, with a total of 83 missing migrants.
Despite the complaints filed with Mexican authorities, the institutional response has been nonexistent. Attorney Yesenia Váldez from the Justice Foundation reported in June 2025 that six months later, there was no trace of the 40 migrants: "Not a single effort has been made to search for them. It's as if the State has erased them."
Cuban families are part of the Regional Network of Migrant Families, which organizes international search brigades in Mexican territory each year. The organization was founded by Honduran Ana Enamorado, mother of Oscar López Enamorado, who disappeared 16 years ago in Mexico, and who vowed to "not return to my country empty-handed" until she finds her son.
The international brigade of 2026 includes families from Ecuador, Honduras, Colombia, and primarily Cuba, along with supporters from Italy. It was divided into two groups: one consisting of Cuban families, who are traveling through Chiapas and Tapachula following the path of their children, and the other consisting of the family of a Colombian who went missing in Mexico City, working alongside the collective "Hasta Encontrarles."
The drama unfolds against the backdrop of a broader migration crisis. On April 30, Yarissel Díaz Arcia, a 19-year-old Cuban from Cienfuegos, disappeared in Tapachula, where she had been stranded since November 2024. In March, the disappearance of eight Cuban rafters was reported as they set out towards the coasts of Mexico.
Mothers and grandmothers are working in coordination with Mexican authorities and arrive with optimism despite their pain. "Their children went out in search of work, they are young and are sure that they are alive," stated Desinformémonos.
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