The victims were shot to death, and their bodies ground up and burned before being dumped in bags in a muddy river, the attorney general said.
Mexico's Attorney General Jesus Murillo Karam speaks during a news conference in Mexico City November 7, 2014.
Reuters / Tomas Bravo
Mexican authorities said Friday they have recovered plastic bags filled with what is likely the bodies and charred remains of at least some of the 43 students who disappeared in September.
Attorney General Jesus Murillo Karam said three suspected gang members captured a week ago confessed to killing the students. The gang members said the students were handed over to them by Jose Luis Abarca, the former mayor of the city of Iguala, and his wife. The victims were shot to death, and their bodies ground up and burned before being dumped in bags in a muddy river in southwest Mexico.
"The fire lasted from midnight to 2:00 p.m. the next day. The criminals could not handle the bodies until 5:00 p.m. due to the heat," he said.
The students, who attended one of the 16 Escuelas Normales in the country that train poor and rural teachers, disappeared Sept. 26, following a confrontation with local police.
"They didn't just burn the bodies with their clothes, they also burned the clothes of those who participated," Murillo Karam said about the suspects. "They tried to erase every possible trace."
Demonstrators march in protest for the disappearance of 43 students in the state of Guerrero, in Mexico City, Wednesday, Nov. 5, 2014.
AP / Marco Ugarte
Karam said the recovered remains would be analyzed at the University of Innsbruck in Austria in order to make a DNA identification.
"I know the enormous pain the information we've obtained causes the family members, a pain we all share," Murillo Karam said at a news conference. "The statements and information that we have gotten unfortunately points to the murder of a large number of people in the municipality of Cocula."
The disappearance of the students drew international outrage and protests in Mexico.
"The investigations will be carried out to the full, all those responsible will be punished under the law," Murillo Karam said.
Families of the missing students said they were holding out hope their loved ones were still alive until the bodies could be identified.
"We will keep pressing that we want them back alive," Manuel Martinez, a spokesman for the families, told AFP.
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