6 bodies found in French Alps

Officials hold a white sheet up to block the view as bodies are loaded into a mortuary van Sunday.Authorities believe the six climbers died SaturdayThey may have been victims of an avalanche, a nearby village mayor says

(CNN) -- The bodies of six climbers were found Sunday in the French Alps, authorities said.

After a hiker spotted the bodies, they were brought by helicopter to the nearby village of Villar d'Arene, local police said, according to a report on French state radio.

Authorities believe the mountaineers died Saturday morning, said the village mayor Xavier Cret.

"It is assumed that there was an avalanche of snow and stones," Cret said.

French police said "all hypotheses are possible" about how the mountain climbers died. "They could have been victims of a broken snow bridge, a fall or an avalanche," the state radio report said.

The bodies were found at about 8,858 feet (2,700 meters) in a very steep pass at la Plate des Agneaux.

CNN

9 bodies discovered in southern Mexico (AP)

MORELIA, Mexico – Mexican authorities said Saturday the bodies of nine victims of suspected drug violence have turned up in the western state of Michoacan.

The state prosecutor's office said in a statement that authorities found eight bodies in three different areas of the port city of Lazaro Cardenas. Three of the cadavers had been dumped in front of the state public security agency.

Another body was found in the state capital of Morelia.

Several of the still unidentified bodies were discovered with messages from a group calling itself the Knights Templar and claiming responsibility for the killings.

The violence is apparently due to a rupture in the La Familia crime organization after the gang's leader, Nazario Moreno, was killed in a shootout with police Dec. 9.

One of the messages, staked to a man's body with an ice pick, read: "This will happen to everyone who supports Chango Mendez."

Jesus Mendez, also known as "El Chango," or "The Monkey," is a suspected leader of the La Familia cartel.

Messages from the Knights Templar first began appearing in March, with the group claiming that it would replace La Familia. Messages left on bodies or hung in public areas are commonly used by drug gangs to threaten rivals, to deny responsibility for crimes or to send messages to authorities.

The name alludes to a Christian order of knights founded in 1118 in Jerusalem to protect pilgrims in the Holy Land after the First Crusade.

On Friday, unidentified criminals set fire to automobiles and buses to block a highway in Michoacan following a shootout with Mexican troops.

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AF447 crash bodies arrive in France

A ship transporting the remains of around 104 victims of the Air France 447 crash arrives in southwestern France Thursday.Ship transporting remains and wreckage arrives in FranceThere are believed to be around 104 bodiesA long process now begins to identify the victims, French authorities say

Paris (CNN) -- The ship carrying the remains of victims and wreckage from the Rio-Paris Air France 447 crash arrived in France on Thursday morning with around 104 bodies on board, according to French police sources.

A French police spokesman said "it is very difficult to give an exact number of bodies, but we believe there to be around 104."

AF 447 crashed two years ago close to the coast of Brazil, killing all on board.

The Ile-de-Sein, the cable ship chartered by French investigation body the BEA, docked at the port of Bayonne for unloading. All access to the port was blocked by police for the sake of discretion for the families of the victims. Dr. Bernd Gans, father of a German victim, said, "They showed us pictures of freezing containers, saying this is how the remains were transported. I think it's right that the families were not present at the port today."

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Once the unloading procedure has been completed, the remains will be sent to the forensic institute in Paris for autopsy and identification. Debris from the aircraft will be sent to a hangar in Toulouse for technical analysis.

Colonel Francois Daoust, head of the Institute of Criminal Research of French National police told French press that identification would be made in two stages, ante mortem and post mortem, through the use of medical records, dental records, comparison with DNA of relatives, and identification of jewellery.

He also described the state of the bodies: "These bodies have been damaged by the shock of the crash. And then nature does the job, obviously. The temperature at 2-3 ° and the almost total lack of oxygen slowed the deterioration process, but after two years, the bodies are inevitably damaged."

Gans told CNN that he had been in Paris Wednesday with other victim's families. "They explained to us that they would start identifying the remains recovered in contrast to what we were told a couple of weeks ago that the bodies could be identified by photos or clothes," he said. "It turns out it's really just a case of remains being identified by DNA. We are afraid that not much remains.

"When we were first told that the bodies could be identified by looking at them I thought... It's brilliant. With the way thing are now, I have changed my mind. They died all together at this particular spot and we should have left them there."

No exact time frame has been given for the process. Daoust told French media, "It will take time. To give you an idea, identifying the first 50 bodies, two years ago, had taken two months of work. For 104 new bodies, up to 40 people will be mobilized for several weeks."

Gans described the reaction of two French victims' relatives at the meeting held for victims relatives. "They were very emotional at this point. They asked if it could be arranged for all the relatives to get the results at the same time, so that some wouldn't be waiting whilst others had results. This was denied by representatives. They said this is the order we have for the investigation. When we have results we have to contact families," he said. "The victims' families will just have to sit and wait. This was very painful to hear."

Operations onboard the Ile-de-Sein came to an end on June 3. A total of 154 bodies have now been brought up, however this still leaves more than 70 which will never be recovered.

Gans explained, "Difficult days begin now. Some families will have hope; will be in this situation of waiting for the next months. Some will have an answer while others will never know."

CNN

Bodies of 104 Air France crash victims to reach Paris (Reuters)

PARIS (Reuters) – The bodies of 104 victims of an Air France flight that crashed into the Atlantic Ocean two years ago will arrive in France on Thursday, starting what promises to be a long process of identification.

Families of the victims have been divided over whether to retrieve the bodies of their kin, or leave them on the seabed where they have been relatively well preserved due to cold temperatures and high water pressure.

French search teams brought up 104 out of 228 victims from the Air France flight A447 to Paris, which plunged into the sea en route from Rio de Janeiro on June 1, 2009.

Some 50 bodies were found floating in the sea in the days after the crash. The remainder will remain submerged.

The first few bodies recovered from the wreckage have been reasonably well preserved, despite suffering some damage as they were lifted off the seabed.

Investigators are hopeful they will be able to identify all the bodies arriving in Paris with the aid of medical and dental records, as well as DNA information.

The process is likely to be lengthy, however, as they will have to collect "ante mortem" information on each victim -- from when they were alive -- to compare it to evidence retrieved from their dead bodies. It took around two months to identify victims retrieved from the surface two years ago.

The bodies are expected to arrive early on Thursday at the port of Bayonne, on the southwest coast of France.

The analysis of "black box" flight recorders from the Air France plane has shed light on the circumstances of the crash, but investigators have yet to provide a conclusive explanation or to say whether crew or faulty machinery were to blame.

The aircraft plunged out of control for four minutes before crashing into the ocean, raising questions over the way crew handled what appeared to be a "stall alarm" emergency, according to data retrieved from the black boxes.

They showed the pilot was absent from the cockpit and a 32-year old junior pilot had pulled the plane's nose up as it became unstable, generating an audible stall warning.

(Reporting by Sophie Louet in Paris and Claude Canellas in Bordeaux, writing by Nick Vinocur; Editing by Jan Harvey)

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21 bodies found outside Mexican town

A state police officer checks bodies found near Morelia, Mexico, on Wednesday night.The bodies were found in five separate locationsSome had signs of torture Authorities are investigating if they are related

(CNN) -- Mexican authorities on Thursday are following leads on a grisly find from the night before -- 21 bodies, some with signs of torture -- strewn in five separate locations on the outskirts of Morelia, Mexico.

Some of the bodies had signs of torture, and other bodies not any, Michoacan state attorney general's office spokesman Jonathan Arredondo told CNN.

At least three bodies had bullet wounds and signs of strangulation, he said.

The bodies were found just outside several exits to the central Mexican city. Authorities found three piles of five victims each, and two piles with three victims each, Arredondo said.

There were notes found at each location, but authorities did not immediately reveal what they said or if any group claimed responsibility.

Despite the similarities at the five locations, Arredondo said it was still unknown if all the bodies were linked.

Morelia is the capital of the state of Michoacan, which is the territory of the violent Familia Michoacana cartel.

The cartel purportedly circulated a letter calling for a truce with authorities last December and January of this year. In the letter, the cartel accused the federal police of committing abuses in the region and blaming it on them.

CNN

Air France crash recovery ends with 74 bodies missing

NEW: 74 bodies will never be foundHuman remains and airplane wreckage are en route to France by ship, investigators sayThe Airbus A330 plane crashed two years ago, killing all 228 people aboardIt took four searches to find the wreckage

Paris (CNN) -- The operation to recover bodies from the crash of Air France 447, which plunged into the Atlantic Ocean two years ago, has ended with 27 more sets of human remains brought to the surface, a French official told CNN on Wednesday.

That means 74 bodies will never be found.

The last group of bodies was brought to the surface on Friday, Philippe Vinogradoff said Wednesday.

A total of 104 bodies were recovered from the remains of the mystery crash during this year's operation, in addition to the 50 that were found in the days after the loss of the plane.

Human remains and aircraft parts are headed by ship to the Canary Islands, where they are expected to arrive Thursday, French air accident investigators said.

From there, they will be transferred to Bayonne in southwest France, investigators said.

All 228 people onboard were killed when the plane crashed in stormy weather en route to Paris from Brazil on June 1, 2009.

It took four searches over the course of nearly two years to locate the bulk of the wreckage, still containing many bodies, in a mountain range deep under the ocean.

Seventy-five bodies were recovered late last month, more than doubling the number of remains that have been found, the vice president of the French victims' association told CNN.

The remains have not yet been identified, Robert Soulas said.

Soulas got the news from a French government liaison appointed to deal with victims' families, he said.

"Personally, I would have preferred to leave the bodies of our loved ones on the seafloor," he added, repeating his long-held view.

Other victims' relatives disagree.

Details of the doomed plane's last minutes began to emerge last month as French air accident investigators studied data recorders recovered from the wreck earlier this year.

The Airbus A330 plummeted 38,000 feet in just three minutes and 30 seconds amid conflicting information that may have led the pilots to make bad decisions, France's Bureau of Investigation and Analysis (BEA) said last month.

The pilots got conflicting air speed readings in the minutes leading up to the crash, according to an interim report. The aircraft climbed to 38,000 feet when "the stall warning was triggered and the airplane stalled," the report says.

Aviation experts are asking why the pilots responded to the stall by pulling the nose up instead of pushing it down to recover.

"You push down on the wheel to gain air speed, perhaps they (pilots) were getting information that the air speed was too high," said Miles O'Brien, a pilot and aviation analyst. "Pulling the nose up will exacerbate an aerodynamic stall."

The speeds displayed on the left primary flight display were "inconsistent" with those on the integrated standby instrument system (ISIS), the report says.

The aircraft experienced some "rolling" before stalling and then descending rapidly at 10,912 feet (3,300 meters) per minute.

At the time of the descent, the two co-pilots and captain were in the aircraft cockpit.

The pilots lost contact with air traffic controllers while flying across an area of the Atlantic Ocean known for constant bands of severe turbulence.

Air crash investigators at the Paris-based BEA have been working on the theory that the speed sensors, known as pitot tubes or probes, malfunctioned because of ice at high altitude.

CNN's Thair Shaikh contributed to this report.

CNN

75 bodies found in Air France wreckage

The remains have not been identified, a French relative saysThe recovery more than doubles the number of bodies found since the 2009 crashAir France 447 plunged into the ocean, killing 228 people

Paris (CNN) -- Seventy-five additional bodies have been recovered from the wreckage of an Air France plane that crashed off the coast of Brazil two years ago, more than doubling the number of remains that have been found, the vice-president of the French victims' association told CNN Tuesday.

The remains have not yet been identified, Robert Soulas said.

Air France 447 plunged into the Atlantic Ocean on June 1, 2009, killing all 228 people aboard. The bulk of the wreckage was found this year after a search by robot submarines of an underwater mountain range.

Many bodies were still in the fuselage, investigators said at the time. Only about 50 bodies were recovered in the days following the crash.

Soulas got the news from a French government liaison appointed to deal with families of victims, he said.

"Personally, I would have preferred to leave the bodies of our loved ones on the seafloor," he added, repeating his long-held view.

The Brazilian national news agency Agencia Brasil reported Tuesday that Nelson Faria Marinho, head of the Brazilian victims organization, said that with the latest recovery, the number of bodies found since the accident now totals 127.

Details of the doomed plane's last minutes only began to emerge last week as French air accident investigators studied data recorders recovered from the wreck earlier this year.

The Airbus A330 plummeted 38,000 feet in just three minutes and 30 seconds amid conflicting information that may have led the pilots to make bad decisions, France's Bureau of Investigation and Analysis (BEA) said Friday.

The pilots got conflicting air speed readings in the minutes leading up to the crash, according to an interim report. The aircraft climbed to 38,000 feet when "the stall warning was triggered and the airplane stalled," the report says.

Aviation experts are asking why the pilots responded to the stall by pulling the nose up instead of pushing it down to recover.

Miles O'Brien, a pilot and aviation analyst, said: "You push down on the wheel to gain air speed, perhaps they (pilots) were getting information that the air speed was too high. Pulling the nose up will exacerbate an aerodynamic stall."

The speeds displayed on the left primary flight display were "inconsistent" with those on the integrated standby instrument system (ISIS), the report says.

The aircraft experienced some "rolling" before stalling and then descending rapidly at 10,912 feet (3,300 meters) per minute.

At the time of the descent, the two co-pilots and captain were in the aircraft cockpit.

All 228 people aboard the Airbus A330 Flight 447 from Rio de Janeiro to Paris were killed on June 1, 2009.

The pilots lost contact with air traffic controllers while flying across an area of the Atlantic Ocean known for constant bands of severe turbulence.

Air crash investigators at the Paris-based BEA have been working on the theory that the speed sensors, known as pitot tubes or probes, malfunctioned because of ice at high altitude.

CNN's Thair Shaikh contributed to this report.

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Tests to reveal ID of 2 Air France bodies

NEW: It could take months to identify the victims of the crash, an official saysEnough DNA is recovered to identify two bodies found this month, the official saysAll 228 people on Air France 447 died when the plane crashed mysteriously two years agoThe bulk of the wreckage was located this year after an unprecedented search

Paris (CNN) -- French air crash investigators expect to be able to identify two bodies recovered this month from an Air France crash that killed 228 people two years ago, an official close to the investigation told CNN Tuesday.

Having recovered enough DNA to know they will be able to identify the victims, police launched a new operation Saturday to bring up more bodies from the wreck on the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean, the official said.

Everyone on board Air France 447 was killed when the plane mysteriously dropped out of the sky en route from Brazil to France on June 1, 2009.

Two years later, no one knows why the Airbus A330 slammed into the ocean in stormy weather, falling so fast that air masks did not have time to drop.

But investigators trying to determine the cause have recovered the complete contents of the flight data recorder and the last two hours of cockpit conversation, they said earlier this month.

It will take several weeks to analyze the data, French air accident experts said May 16.

Discovering that there was data on the recorders "is excellent news. It is really going to help us work out what happened on that plane," said Martine Del Bono, spokeswoman for France's Bureau of Investigation and Analysis (BEA).

The cockpit voice recorder and flight data recorder were found at the beginning of May after an unprecedented series of submarine searches of a mountain range 3,900 meters (12,700 feet) under the ocean. They were brought to the surface and taken to Paris by ship and plane.

The investigators recovered two bodies from the fuselage -- after finding only about 50 bodies in the days immediately after the crash.

They said this month that they would not bring up more bodies if they could not identify the two they already have. But after recovering enough DNA to identify the bodies, they launched a new operation this weekend, the official close to the investigation told CNN Tuesday.

The bodies have not actually been identified yet, adding that the process could take months, said the official, who asked not to be identified discussing sensitive details of the investigation.

The bulk of the plane, located earlier this year, contains many more human remains, according to investigators.

Recovering more bodies will be a difficult task, with miles of cable required to bring each one up over a period of three hours, they said.

Investigators also brought an engine and an avionics bay containing computers to the surface, they said.

The pilots of Air France 447 lost contact with air traffic controllers while flying across an area of the Atlantic known for severe turbulence, officials said. But exactly what caused the plane to plunge into the ocean remains a mystery.

The fuselage was discovered in April with bodies still inside, investigators said.

Some relatives of those who died have expressed reservations about remains being brought to the surface.

Last month Robert Soulas, head of a support group for families of flight victims, said: "For me, personally I would like to leave the bodies of my children, my two children, on the seabed."

Other relatives have called for the bodies to be recovered.

CNN's Winnie Andrews in Paris contributed to this report.

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14 bodies recovered from Mexican mine blast

SAN JUAN DE SABINAS, Mexico (AP) — Rescue crews recovered the last of 14 bodies early Sunday from a coal mine wracked by a gas explosion last week, while Labor Secretary Javier Lozano called for an overhaul of mine safety in Mexico.

Mexican officials said the blast Tuesday was caused by a buildup of gas. The national mine workers union said the mine's work force was not unionized and accused the government of allowing mines to operate with unsafe conditions.

The explosion was so powerful it also seriously injured a teenager who reportedly lost an arm as he was worked on the surface outside the mine. Lozano said earlier that the boy's employment at the mine was an apparent violation of labor laws.

In announcing that the last body had been recovered, Lozano said his ministry would embark on a project to make sure all mining companies follow the law and provide safe conditions for their workers.

"We want clean coal, coal without blood," he said.

A similar blast caused by a methane gas buildup killed 65 miners in February 2006 at Mexico's Pasta de Conchos coal mine in nearby San Juan de Sabinas.

Ramiro Flores Morales, a state legislator who says he is the city's local record keeper, said there have been dozens of explosions and deaths for various reasons in the area's coal mines over more than two decades, though there was no independent confirmation of his statistics.

Since the Pasta de Conchos tragedy, Flores said, the government "has promised to increase the number of inspectors ? to increase safety measures and to provide training for miners, and none of this has happened."

Instead, Flores said, two things remain constant: "The cry and demand from loved ones to recover the bodies for proper burial and the fact that mining continues to be the only local source of employment."

President Felipe Calderon was expected to travel on Monday to the mine, which is about 85 miles (135 kilometers) southwest of Eagle Pass, Texas, to offer condolences and government support to the families.

Several top officials in his government were expected to visit as well, including the secretary of energy and the federal prosecutor for labor violations.

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Bodies, wreckage photos published

NEW: Analysts say wrecked chopper likely was a stealth aircraftReuters published graphic photos of the compound WednesdayThe pictures include the bodies of three men and helicopter wreckageOther photos show the helicopter abandoned by the SEAL team

(CNN) -- Pictures taken shortly after the raid that killed al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden show three men lying dead in pools of blood and the wreckage of a U.S. helicopter abandoned during the assault.

One of the dead men bears a family resemblance to bin Laden, but there was no confirmation of his identity. The al Qaeda leader's adult son was among those killed in Monday's attack by U.S. commandos, according to American officials.

The pictures were published Wednesday by Reuters. The news agency says they were taken by a Pakistani security official about an hour after U.S. forces left bin Laden's compound and that it is confident of the authenticity of the purchased images.

Clad in a T-shirt, the man who resembles bin Laden lies in a large pool of blood that appears to spread from the back of his head. Two other men, dressed in Pakistani clothing, appear to have died from extensive head and chest wounds.

Sources have named the courier who lived at the compound as al Qaeda veteran Sheikh Abu Ahmad -- a Kuwaiti citizen of Pakistani descent.

Other photos, taken at dawn on Monday show the wreckage of the helicopter the U.S. Navy SEAL team had to leave behind after a crash-landing. Analysts believe it to be a stealth aircraft; the tail assembly is different from known helicopter types and could indicate some kind of previously unknown capability to avoid radar.

A senior U.S. official tells CNN that a tail portion of the helicopter was not destroyed, and that, to the best of his knowledge, that wreckage remains in the hands of the Pakistani government.

In particular, the tail features a cowling that might have been designed to reduce rotor noise levels, they said.

Pakistan has already said that the helicopters used in the raid took advantage of blind spots in radar coverage to penetrate deep into its territory undetected.

CNN's Chris Lawrence contributed to this report.

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3 bodies found in Mexico mass graves identified

MEXICO CITY (AP) — Mexican forensic investigators say they have identified three of the 183 bodies found in mass graves in Tamaulipas and returned their remains to family members.

The federal prosecutors office says two men were from the central Mexican state of Tlaxcala and another was from Guanajuato.

Their bodies were among the 120 cadavers transported to Mexico City after mass graves holding 183 bodies were unearthed in San Fernando, Tamaulipas, over the past month.

Forensic investigators have been taking DNA samples from people who believe their missing family members may be among the dead.

Many victims are believed to be migrants headed to the United States who fell victim to the Zetas drug gang. The northeastern state of Tamaulipas borders Texas.

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For more information about reprints & permissions, visit our FAQ's. To report corrections and clarifications, contact Standards Editor Brent Jones. For publication consideration in the newspaper, send comments to letters@usatoday.com. Include name, phone number, city and state for verification. To view our corrections, go to corrections.usatoday.com.We've updated the Conversation Guidelines. Changes include a brief review of the moderation process and an explanation on how to use the "Report Abuse" button. Read more.

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72 bodies at burial site as Mexicans seek missing

By Alexandre Meneghini, AP

People wait to know if missing relatives are among bodies found Wednesday in a mass grave in Matamoros, northern Mexico.

EnlargeCloseBy Alexandre Meneghini, AP

People wait to know if missing relatives are among bodies found Wednesday in a mass grave in Matamoros, northern Mexico.

Finally a strange man answered: "Stop bothering me. He doesn't have this phone anymore. If you keep bothering me, you'll see what happens."

Though he had yet to identify the body, Cote said his father's driver's license was recovered in one of the graves as people across Mexico contacted authorities in search of the disappeared, including dozens who vanished from buses as they crossed the same part of northern Mexico headed to the United States.

Federal authorities said they have 14 people in custody related to the second mass killing in violent Tamaulipas state, the scene of a massacre of 72 migrants last August.

But no one could explain the horror of innocent civilians pulled off buses and out of cars on a well-traveled stretch of highway patrolled by the Mexican military that runs near the Gulf Coast to the U.S. border.

"How sick do you have to be to commit such atrocities," said Cote, whose 55-year-old father traveled from their home in central Tlaxcala state to pick up a minivan in late March. The family buys and sells used cars.

"Killing and mutilating people just because you can," Cote, 32, said amid the stench outside the morgue in Matamoros, a city across the border from Brownsville, Texas, where the bodies were taken.

As investigators looked for more mass graves, calls from people and state governments around Mexico about the missing shed new light on the problem of the drug war's disappeared. More than 34,600 people have died in drug-related violence since President Felipe Calderon launched his offensive against organized crime in late 2006, but no one knows how many people are missing at the hands of drug cartels.

The National Human Rights Commission recently reported it has registered 5,397 people who have gone missing since 2006, but stressed they were not all drug-related. Spokesman Cesar Correa said such a study has never been done.

All day on Friday families were turned away in Matamoros as morgue officials said they would have no information until at least Monday. State authorities are still not sure about the origin of the victims found in the pits.

The majority of victims were men, though four women were among the bodies that authorities started to recover on April 1 while investigating reports that gunmen had begun stopping buses and pulling off some passengers in the area in late March.

Federal security spokesman Alejandro Poire said the suspects led authorities to the pits. The suspects belonged to a "criminal cell," he said, but he did not specify which one.

Authorities speculate the men pulled off the buses fell victim to ever more brutal recruiting efforts by cartels to replenish their ranks. But one local politician, who didn't want to be quoted by name for safety reasons, said there were rumors that the Gulf cartel was sending buses of people to fight its rival, the Zetas, who control that stretch of road and who began boarding buses in search of enemies.

Investigators interviewing witnesses on the bus abductions calculated that from 65 to 82 people went missing, according to Tamaulipas state Tamaulipas state Interior Secretary Morelos Canseco.

Some who came to the morgue had no reason to believe their missing relatives would have been in San Fernando in late March, when the complaints first came in.

Margarita Avellaneda, 41, clutched the flier she has posted around Matamoros since her husband disappeared in October. Gustavo Contreras, 54, was looking for a cousin also not heard from since October as he hitched a ride with the San Fernando mayor-elect. Both vanished.

Ambrosio Leon Rodriguez, 60, came looking for his brother-in-law, who has been missing since he went to board a bus in February in the Tamaulipas port city of Tampico.

"We don't know why they disappeared, but we want to know if they're here," said Avellaneda, whose husband went to pick up a friend near their home in Matamoros. Neither have been heard from since.

Griselda Guerrero, 22, said her relatives disappeared on a bus in Tamaulipas in March 2010 as they headed with other migrants to the U.S. They never found a trace of the bus or the passengers, she said.

Tamaulipas authorities have heard from officials in several states across Mexico looking for residents reported missing from buses that had crossed Tamaulipas, Canseco said.

Suana Montero, a spokeswoman for the Guanajuato state attorney general, said 17 residents of the state haven't been heard from since taking an Omnibus de Mexico bus to northern Mexico in March. The bus route and exact date were unknown, but Montero said they were apparently traveling to the United States.

An official with the Mexican Attorney General's Office said 43 residents of the central states of Queretaro, Hidalgo and San Luis Potosi headed to the U.S. in buses disappeared in March and early April. The official agreed to disclose those details only if she wasn't quoted by name because she was not authorized to talk about the investigation.

"We have information that they got to the state of Tamaulipas," the official said.

Relatives who have filed missing-person reports across Mexico are sending DNA samples to Mexico City, she added.

Michoacan state Attorney General Jesus Mandujano said at least 13 residents of that western state have disappeared in Tamaulipas. In addition, Mandujano said, an unknown number of people from the city of Uruapan went missing while traveling in a bus to Tamaulipas.

Canseco told the Milenio television channel that he had yet to hear from other countries, particularly those in Central America, the origin of thousands of migrants who cross Mexico each year on their way to the U.S.

The victims of the massacre last August were from El Salvador, Honduras, Guatemala, Ecuador and Brazil. Survivors said they were killed for refusing to work for the Zetas drug cartel. Fourteen of those bodies still have not been identified.

Although a federal offensive has been underway in the region since November, criminals have become so brazen they apparently kidnapped the bus passengers on a stretch of highway that area people say lay between two military checkpoints.

Cote said he and his father, also named Pablo Cote, traveled the road often between Tlaxcala and Tamaulipas for their used-car business, passing through military and federal police roadblocks. He said they knew about the dead migrants and heard stories of crimes along the road, but they never saw anything strange.

When they were in San Fernando, sometimes they would see armed men, Cote said.

"There they are," the locals would say.

He said his father arrived in San Fernando by bus on March 30 and stayed only a few hours before heading back to Tlaxcala. He told his son he would call when he reached Tampico. He was never heard from again. He left behind Cote and four daughters.

The family did everything together.

"I don't have words," Cote said. "My family is destroyed ... as the days go by, the pain only increases."

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