Las Rastreadoras del Fuerte: The mothers digging for Mexico's disappeared - ABC News

Foreign Correspondent: Marco Cesar Ontiveros Calderon.

Foreign Correspondent: Marco Cesar Ontiveros Calderon.

Almost 90,000 people have disappeared in Mexico, the vast majority since 2006 when the government began waging war on the country's powerful drug trafficking cartels, unleashing an epidemic of deadly violence.

Foreign Correspondent: Marco Cesar Ontiveros Calderon.

Later that year, Mexico's current president Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador came to power vowing to step up efforts to find and identify bodies. But the number of missing has continued to grow. Last year nearly 7,000 more were reported as disappeared, down only slightly from a record 8,804 in 2019.

Foreign Correspondent: Marco Cesar Ontiveros Calderon.

Foreign Correspondent: Marco Cesar Ontiveros Calderon.

"We take in people whose family members have disappeared and from the moment they walk through the office door, the missing person stops being thought of as missing and starts being thought of as a treasure we have to find.".

Foreign Correspondent: Marco Cesar Ontiveros Calderon.

Foreign Correspondent: Marco Cesar Ontiveros Calderon.

Foreign Correspondent: Marco Cesar Ontiveros Calderon.

Foreign Correspondent: Marco Cesar Ontiveros Calderon.

Foreign Correspondent: Marco Cesar Ontiveros Calderon.

Foreign Correspondent: Marco Cesar Ontiveros Calderon.

Foreign Correspondent: Marco Cesar Ontiveros Calderon.

Joining Mirna on the dig is Delfina Herrera Ruiz, whose brother Reynaldo disappeared in January 2016 near Los Mochis.

Foreign Correspondent: Marco Cesar Ontiveros Calderon.

Foreign Correspondent: Marco Cesar Ontiveros Calderon

Foreign Correspondent: Marco Cesar Ontiveros Calderon

If it is a match to one of the more than 1,500 local missing people in the Trackers of El Fuerte records, they go and inform the families in person

Local government forensics teams have identified over a 120 missing people, more than half related to members of the Trackers of El Fuerte

Foreign Correspondent: Marco Cesar Ontiveros Calderon

The Trackers of El Fuerte lobbied the current government to do more to help them find their missing loved ones

This has inspired Mirna to return to the classroom where she reaches out and talks to youth about the pitfalls of cartel life, much of which has been glamourised on popular reality shows, TV series and in music. "Most young people want to be hitmen, dealers, chiefs of gangs… so unfortunately this leads to the cycle of drug usage, selling drugs and finally, belonging to a gang."

Foreign Correspondent: Marco Cesar Ontiveros Calderon

My neighbour, my cousin, my uncle, my brother…'" Some children whose father or brother have disappeared keep quiet, or reach out to Mirna discretely, fearful of the stigma that comes with a family connection to drug trafficking

There are now over 60 organisations across Mexico like the Trackers of El Fuerte, where mothers and family members comb the countryside for their missing loved ones

Foreign Correspondent: Marco Cesar Ontiveros Calderon