A mother was killed while she was searching for her disappeared son in northern Mexico.

Rosario Rodríguez Barraza’s body was found in Sinaloa on Tuesday, where she was working with an activist organization to find the remains of her son who disappeared three years ago.

Officials have released limited details about the circumstances of Barraza’s death.

Sinaloa Congresswoman Paloma Sánchez said she was killed near her home in the state.

It happened in an area which lends its name to one of Mexico’s most brutal drug gangs – the Sinaloa Cartel, which was once led by Joaquín ‘El Chapo’ Guzmán.

Most of the 100,000 people missing in Mexico disappeared after the start of the Mexican Drug War in 2006.

Barraza was working activists, often called ‘seekers’ or ‘searchers.’ They are made up mostly of mothers looking for their children that went missing without a trace.

In an effort to make sure they don’t become targets themselves, most searchers say publicly that they aren’t looking for evidence against their loved ones’ killers, instead seeking emotional closure.

‘I’m looking for my son, I’m not looking for the culprits,’ Barraza can be heard saying in a video posted by the group Hasta Encontrarles.

Despite this, Barraza was the third volunteer searcher killed in Mexico since 2021.

Barraza’s son, Fernando Ramírez Rodríguez, was abducted in Sinaloa in October 2019. He was 20-years-old when armed men snatched him off the streets of La Cruz.

An official police investigation failed to turn up any results, and authorities were never even able to determine if he was still alive.

‘I took them videos, I brought them witnesses, and up to now, they have not done anything for me,’ Barraza said.

‘I deeply regret the murder of Rosario Rodríguez Barraza, a tireless fighter like many other Sinaloan women who are looking for their loved ones,’ said Sinaloa Governor Rubén Rocha Moya.

Moya said the state government was fully investigating Barraza’s death, which he called an ‘insidious crime.’

‘My solidarity for their loved ones and for the groups of seekers and seekers of their relatives,’ he said.

Barraza’s death was announced on the International Day of the Disappeared on August 30.

The day was marked in Mexico with mass protests and demonstrations in the capitol of Mexico City.

The protestors, who wore photos of their loved ones around their necks, paraded through downtown Mexico City, chanting ‘Where are they? Our Children, Where are they?’

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