Mexico City . Laura Kabata, the mother of a young man who was assaulted and tortured in 2009 by members of the Army in the state of Chihuahua , bled to death outside the Ministry of the Interior (Segob) on Friday to demand that the head of the Ministry of National Defense (Sedena), Luis Cresencio Sandoval, fulfill his promise to help her punish those responsible for the abuses.
The woman showed up at the entrance to the Segob (Ministry of the Interior) office on Bucareli Avenue on Friday afternoon and inserted a catheter into the vein in her left wrist to force blood to drip . She used it to write on the wall of the building slogans such as "Justice for Oscar" (referring to her son) and "Promises are kept," in addition to leaving her handprints.
“My son, Oscar Kabata, was a victim of the Sedena (National Guard). When he was 17, he was kidnapped, threatened, tortured, and sexually assaulted. His friend, Víctor Vaca, was killed in front of my son from so many blows. He couldn't take it anymore; the soldiers pulled out a pistol and shot him dead,” the woman said in an interview with La Jornada .
As reported in this newspaper, Kabata was detained by military personnel on February 26, 2009 in Ciudad Juárez, Chihuahua , who subjected him for almost four days to acts of physical, psychological and sexual torture, in a case that led the National Human Rights Commission (CNDH) to issue Recommendation 38VG/2020 .
"My son is a survivor and witness to all of this, to the infamous Chihuahua Joint Operation, at the hands of the brilliant General Felipe de Jesús Espitia Hernández. The Secretary (of National Defense) said he would resolve our problems, that he would help us, so I'm honoring his promise," the protester said.
According to Laura Kabata, "more than 13 years of protests, promises, detailed reports, letters, and recommendations issued by the CNDH have passed , but it is those agencies that are there to defend human rights that have stalked and intimidated us the most."
The blood she used to write slogans on the walls of the SG this Friday, she said, "is the blood all of us victims have shed, because we no longer have tears. My son is dead in life, and the sons and daughters of my friends have been killed or disappeared. These are the tears each of us has shed."
After bleeding to death for two hours, Kabata fainted and was later treated by a team of paramedics who arrived at the scene to stabilize her.
