Mexican authorities have identified the body of José Ángel Hernández Vélez, one of the ten miners kidnapped in Sinaloa on January 23, who worked for the Canadian company Vizsla Silver. According to Mexican media, the body was found after the discovery of an illegal grave near the community of El Verde in the municipality of Concordia, where the miners disappeared. It was reported that Hernández's relatives were notified of his death by the Specialized Prosecutor's Office for Organized Crime (FEMDO) of the Attorney General's Office (FGR), and that collectives searching for missing persons, such as Por las Voces Sin Justicia, demanded that the number of bodies and human remains found in this grave be made public. The location of Hernández's body, a native of Zacatecas, sparked reactions on social media, including a post by the senator from that state, Geovanna Bañuelos. 'I deeply regret the death of José Ángel Hernández Vélez, a Zacatecan miner from Cañitas de Felipe Pescador. No family should have to live through the anguish of a disappearance or the pain of such a loss,' Bañuelos pointed out on her X account. The discovery of Hernández's body comes two days after the FGR reported the arrest of four people in this case, as well as the location of bodies and human remains in Concordia, among which was a subject with characteristics similar to one of the 10 kidnapped miners. According to testimonies from the missing miners' relatives cited by local media, the miners were illegally deprived of their freedom by an armed commando on the morning of Friday, January 23. Sinaloa, one of the main mineral-producing states in the country, also faces a persistent problem of violence and insecurity linked to organized crime, which has impacted both local communities and productive sectors, including the mining industry.
