Mexico: Miners’ Bodies Recovered in Major Step Toward Justice

After nearly two decades of intense litigation, Fund grantee OFPC announces a historic step toward justice and accountability for the Pasta de Conchos mine disaster in Mexico.

Earlier this month, the Mexican government announced that the first human remains of miners killed in an industrial disaster 18 years ago had been recovered from the Pasta de Conchos mine. The repatriation of their bodies is a major step toward securing justice and holding those responsible for the disaster to account. 

La Organización Familia Pasta de Conchos (OFPC), a Fund grantee in Coahuila State, has been advocating the Mexican government since 2006 to investigate the disaster and recover the bodies. Now, after nearly two decades of intense litigation, their hard work and determination has moved the government to act. 

Cristina Auerbach, founder and director of OFPC, said:

The news of the recovery of the first remains of the victims is due exclusively to the perseverance of the families. After almost two decades, it is clear that the demands of the families have always been just and reasonable, what was lacking during all this time was the political will of the authorities.

Sixty-five miners were killed on February 19, 2006, when an accumulation of methane gas exploded underground at the Pasta de Conchos mine in San Juan de Sabinas, Coahuila. According to Fund grantee Centro Prodh, the mine had a long history of safety failures, poor standards, and dire working conditions. Grupo Mexico, the Mexican conglomerate that owned and operated the mine, suspended their efforts to recover the bodies after just a year, spiting demands by the miners’ bereaved families. No one was held legally responsible for the tragedy. 

In 2010, OFPC, supported by Centro Prodh, presented their case before the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights. They argued that the Mexican state was liable for not ensuring that safety standards were maintained in the mine and delaying the investigation process. In 2018, the court ruled in favor of the miners’ families. 

Five years after the Mexican government established a committee for repatriation and justice in Pasta de Conchos, the first bodies have finally been recovered from the wreckage of the mine. This is a significant step toward meeting the demands of the miners’ families and establishing responsibility for the deadly negligence that caused this disaster. 

Ricardo González Bernal, who leads the Fund’s Latin America program, said:

This is a clear example that supporting the survivors and families of human rights violations in their journey for justice is not only strategic but also the right thing to do. It took 18 years, and now justice and closure are finally on the horizon. Throughout this time, the struggle of the families served to inspire their communities to search for alternatives to the dependency on the mining industry.  No matter how long the journey, the quest for justice transforms everything in its path.

In Mexico, and around the world, the rights to truth and justice are nonnegotiable. For years, we have been proud to support OFPC’s unflagging pursuit of due process for the miners of Pasta de Conchos. We congratulate them on this important achievement and historic step toward justice.