Their families have been waiting for answers for more than 15 years. At around 11 p.m. on 12 February 2008, Mauricio Estrada Zamora, a 38-year-old crime reporter for the newspaper La Opinión de Apatzingán, left the newsroom to go home. He has not been seen since. José Antonio Garcia Apac, founder and editor of the weekly Eco de la Cuenca del Tepalcatepec, disappeared on 20 November 2006, after reportedly being arrested by security forces. Maria Esther Aguilar Cansimbe, a 32-year-old journalist for El Diario de Zamora and Cambio de Michoacán and mother of two girls aged seven and nine at the time of her disappearance, has not been heard from since November 2019. Not a trace has been found of Ramon Angeles Zalpa, a reporter for the daily newspaper Cambio de Michoacán since 2010.

In response to the authorities' consistent failure to bring those responsible to justice, on 10 and 11 March a joint delegation from RSF and its partner in Mexico, Propuesta Cívica, travelled to Geneva to carry out an advocacy mission at the United Nations. The mission sought to make the disappearances of these journalists a priority within the international human rights protection system, given the Mexican state’s failure to act, and the delegates reiterated the need for a stronger response from the UN. Currently, 28 journalists are missing in Mexico, including some who have been missing since 1995.

“The situation in Mexico is serious. Journalists are going missing against a backdrop of structural violence, criminal governance and control over the public prosecutor’s offices, highlighting a pattern of violence against the press tolerated by the state and characterised by systematic omissions and a lack of justice. Sustained international action is urgently needed to help break the cycle of total impunity that persists in the country. We also call on the Mexican government to do everything in its power to provide answers to the families.

“It is essential that the technical capacities of the public prosecutor’s offices be strengthened and that the effectiveness of investigations into disappearances in Mexico be ensured, particularly by identifying criminal networks and their possible links with state actors. The country has not yet developed a national policy for investigating long-standing disappearances that would allow cases where omissions were made during the initial investigations to be re-examined, using new forensic technologies and updated lines of inquiry.

During the visit, the delegation held meetings with key actors in the international protection system, including the secretariat and the petitions unit of the Human Rights Committee, the office of the Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of the right to freedom of opinion and expression, the Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances, and the head of the Americas Section of the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights.

The mission focused on four emblematic cases of missing journalists in the state of Michoacán, where the involvement of state agents, or the inaction of the security forces, public prosecutors and the judiciary in response to their disappearance, can be solidly documented by the two organisations. These cases are at various stages in the legal process and could lead to key decisions regarding the Mexican state’s international responsibility in these disappearances.

The cases of Mauricio Estrada Zamora (2008) and Ramon Angeles Zalpa (2010) were submitted to the United Nations in 2022 and received by the Human Rights Committee. The Mexican State has submitted its observations RSF and Propuesta Cívica have submitted their replies. The cases are ready for consideration by the Committee.

In August 2025, the cases of José Antonio Garcia Apac (2006) and Maria Esther Aguilar Cansimbe (2009) were also referred to the United Nations Human Rights Committee. However, RSF and Propuesta Cívica are still waiting for the Committee to officially accept the cases.