The family of Zoila Márquez Chiu, a journalist with the Linea Informativa news website who disappeared on 7 December, has confirmed that she returned to her home in the central state of Zacatecas on 23 December. She was missing for 17 days.
The family of Zoila Márquez Chiu, a journalist with the Linea Informativa news website who disappeared on 7 December, has confirmed that she returned to her home in the central state of Zacatecas on 23 December. She was missing for 17 days.
“We are relieved to learn that Márquez is back with her family,” Reporters Without Borders said. “Officials say she did not suffer any attack but the circumstances of her disappearance are still largely unexplained. It is unusual for a missing person to turn up again in Mexico, where 17 journalists have disappeared in the past decade, two of them this year.”
Márquez’s father, Humberto Márquez Sandoval, said the family was “happy that she is back,” described her as “a bit nervous” but did not explain the reasons for her disappearance.
Línea Informativa editor Omar Hernández said: “It is not up to me to give an explanation for her disappearance and I don’t have one. I think the authorities should be more transparent about the case.”
He nonetheless thanked the authorities for the effort they put into the search for Márquez. He also thanked Reporters Without Borders, Article 19 and the Zacatecas Association of Women Journalists for following the case.