Protests are spreading across Mexico over the case of 43 university students who went missing in September, a mass disappearance believed to be linked to powerful drug cartels with the complicity of corrupt police forces and local politicians in Guerrero state.

Mexico's Deputy Foreign Minister for Multilateral Affairs and Human Rights, Juan Manuel Gomez Robledo, tells France 24 how the investigation is progressing. Human remains have been found by the authorities and have been sent to an Austrian laboratory for analysis. But “until we know exactly the identity of the remains”, he says, “we need to consider them as missing, as a case of forced disappearance and we are still trying to locate them.”

Mexico's grim record of impunity is a well-known fact, but Juan Manuel Gomez Robledo believes that the recent protests and demonstrations have “proved at least that both Mexican society and the government have a deeper sense of the importance of protecting human rights”.

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