Firefighters extinguish a garbage truck that demonstrators set on fire during a protest marking the 11th anniversary of the disappearance of 43 students from an Ayotzinapa rural teacher’s college, outside the entrance of Campo Militar, in Mexico City, Thursday, Sept. 25, 2025. (AP Photo/Fernando Llano)
Soldiers and firefighters work the scene after demonstrators lit a garbage truck on fire during a protest marking the 11-year anniversary of the disappearance of 43 students from an Ayotzinapa rural teacher’s college, outside the entrance of Campo Militar, in Mexico City, Thursday, Sept. 25, 2025. (AP Photo/Fernando Llano)
Protesters in Mexico ram gates of military base to protest 43 students who disappeared
MEXICO CITY (AP) — Protesters who want justice in the case of 43 students who disappeared in 2014 rammed the gates of a military base in Mexico City with a truck Thursday and set the vehicle on fire.
Firefighters extinguish a garbage truck that demonstrators set on fire during a protest marking the 11th anniversary of the disappearance of 43 students from an Ayotzinapa rural teacher’s college, outside the entrance of Campo Militar, in Mexico City, Thursday, Sept. 25, 2025. (AP Photo/Fernando Llano)
MEXICO CITY (AP) — Protesters who want justice in the case of 43 students who disappeared in 2014 rammed the gates of a military base in Mexico City with a truck Thursday and set the vehicle on fire.
The protest came on the eve of the anniversary of the disappearance of the Ayotzinapa Rural Teachers’ College students, a case that for many Mexicans has become emblematic of state involvement in bloodshed in the Latin American nation.
The students in 2014 had that they planned to drive to Mexico City for a protest commemorating a 1968 massacre of protesters by government forces.
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Authorities believe the students were abducted on the way and with ties to government and military officials, and dozens of people have been arrested, including a former attorney general, local officials, military and police officers.
However, nobody has been convicted yet, and many protesters believe the state involvement in the Ayotzinapa killings may go deeper than what has been revealed so far.
Current students from the school, in the southern Mexican state of Guerrero, joined for a demonstration at the military base to push Mexico's army to help clarify the disappearances. The protesters carried photos of the missing.
Shortly afterward, some of the young demonstrators with their faces covered backed a truck into one of the entrances of the military compound. Once the vehicle was stuck, they launched fireworks at it until it caught fire.
Authorities reported no injuries.
Thursday’s action could signal more aggressive protests to come on Friday, the 11-year anniversary of the brutal attack.
Many of the – neither the motive nor the fate of the victims has been fully established, though the charred remains of three of them have been identified.
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Following many years of cover-ups, a government truth commission in 2022 declared the disappearance of the Ayotzinapa students a “state crime.”
Authorities believe all the that trafficked heroin and acted in collusion with security forces and local, state and federal authorities, including military personnel.
The case continues to fuel outrage across Mexico. For years, families and their lawyers have demanded Mexican armed forces hand over hundreds of documents that could be the key to solving the case, but the military hasn’t done so.
While President Claudia Sheinbaum has replaced the prosecutor in charge of the case and insists there are new lines of investigation, families say they’ve seen no progress.
