Missing Mexican students: President to make 'important announcement'

Mexico City, Nov 25 (IANS/EFE) With the missing students crisis getting out of hand and due to the resulting embarrassment in the international arena, Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto will make an "important announcement" about the restoration of legality in the country, a senior government official has announced.

"The president will have to take decisions on what has not worked, on what has to be replaced and changed. He will make an important announcement this same week," government secretary Miguel Angel Osorio said Monday.

However, he did not provide details about the announcement but said it would be made by Thursday, and would deal with areas where there are concerns, especially regarding municipalities.

Osorio also justified the arrests made last week for violence during protests demanding that the 43 students, who went missing two months ago from the southern town of Iguala after being rounded up by police, be returned alive.

Meanwhile, demonstrations continue across the country.

About 200 teachers affiliated to the State Coordinator of Education Workers of Guerrero (CETEG) Monday took control of Electoral Tribunal offices and the office of the federal public prosecutor in Chilpancingo, the capital of Guerrero.

CETEG, which opposes education reforms proposed by Peña Nieto, has led several protests - some of them violent - in relation to the missing students case.

According to the public prosecutor's office, the municipal police attacked and detained the students on the night of Sep 26 on the orders of then Iguala mayor Jose Luis Abarca and handed them over to the Guerreros Unidos crime cartel who killed them and burned their bodies.

However, this version of the events has not been accepted by the families of the missing as they await results of DNA tests of the apparent remains recovered from the site where the bodies were burned.

--IANS/EFE

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