14ymedio, Ángel Salinas, Mexico city, 12 March 2025 — Margarita Bravo has not heard from her daughter, Meiling Álvarez Bravo, 40, and her grandson, Samei Armando Reyes Álvarez, 14, for 81 days, and the Cuban consulate in Mexico, to which she appealed, asked her to “stay strong.” The two of them, along with four other Cubans, Dairanis Tan Ramos and Elianis, Jorge and Lorena, who were in Tapachula, Chiapas, have been missing since 21 December.
“Breakfast is here, we might leave now, mami. Kisses, I’ll write to you later.” This was the last audio message Bravo received from her daughter that day. Months of uncertainty and worry have followed since then. This Havana native tells 14ymedio that her daughter and grandson left in search of a better future, but their journey has turned into a nightmare.
The woman says that the last point of reference for her family members was a house near Parque Hidalgo, in Tapachula. From this place they were to be picked up by a coyote identified by the alias Chapín. “The man was paid 2,000 dollars” to take them by boat to Juchitán, in the state of Oaxaca, so that they could avoid the checkpoints of the National Migration Institute (INM).
When she did not hear from Meiling and Samei, who usually provide travel updates, Margarita dialled their cellphones, but got no answer to the calls or messages. “I don’t know what’s happening, the messages aren’t being received.”
An acquaintance, she continues, filed a report with the Chiapas State Attorney General’s Office about the disappearance of Meiling and Samei. She also “presented herself at the Siglo XXI and Huixtla migration stations, but there is no record of them there.” She also contacted the Cuban Consulate in Mexico to present the case.
From Nebraska (USA), another daughter, Mayelin, contacted the coyote, but he told her that he knew nothing about the Cubans, that “the National Guard probably had them.” When asked about their whereabouts, he changed his story and said that “they were probably arrested by immigration agents.”
This Chapín even suggested that they could have been victims of kidnapping by the criminal cells operating in the region. When questioned about the money he was paid for the transfer, he stated that the Cubans had left with another coyote. “I don’t have anything to do with them any more,” he said.
“We don’t know if it’s true or not, because he was the one who was paid,” says Margarita.
Meiling and Samei entered Mexico through the southern border on 18 December. They had started their journey on the 12th of the month, when they left the island on a flight to Nicaragua. According to Margarita Bravo, a couple of Guatemalan coyotes identified as Marilyn and Rafael took them to the Guatemalan border.
Among the missing is also Dairanis Tan Ramos. The migrant, from Camagüey, according to a cousin’s report on Facebook, has had no contact with her family since 18 December.
In addition to these disappearances, there has been a wave of kidnappings of Cubans in Tapachula. A man ordered “Take the Cubans away,” on his radio, to his armed accomplices, according to a witness. Since November, there has been no news of Reynaldo Leyva Izquierdo, 54, Dalviris Domínguez (47), Leonel Gutiérrez (28) and Jorge Luis Gutiérrez López (58), who didn’t make it to the USA .
In the same month, Cuban nationals Leydi de la Caridad Rodríguez Acosta and Ana Mercedes Capetillo Savón were also kidnapped and murdered. Their dismembered bodies were left in a waste tank between the Chiapas communities of Pumpuapa and Nueva Granada.
Translated by GH
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