Mexican authorities announced on Friday that federal forces had discovered a body believed to be one of the 10 employees of a Canadian mining company who were abducted three weeks ago in the state of Sinaloa. The attorney general’s office released a statement confirming the finding of “bodies and human remains” during the ongoing search for the missing employees of Vizsla Silver Corp.
The statement mentioned that one of the bodies exhibited similar characteristics to one of the individuals reported missing, and efforts were underway to confirm the identity. It did not specify the exact number of bodies found. To date, four individuals have been arrested in connection with the kidnapping.
The Vancouver-based company’s 10 employees were taken on January 23 from the city of Concordia, located approximately 50 kilometers east of the coastal city of Mazatlán. Vizsla Silver stated in an email to CBC News that they were cooperating with Mexican authorities and supporting the affected families but refrained from providing further details.
Vizsla Silver had previously halted field operations on April 4, 2025, for its Panuco mining project in Sinaloa due to security concerns in the region, as disclosed in a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).
The United Nations Committee on Forced Disappearances is closely monitoring the situation in Sinaloa following the case of a 26-year-old engineer, Pablo Osorio Sanchez, who was abducted on the same day and in the same city as the Vizsla employees. The UN committee has highlighted potential collusion between state agents and criminal elements in disappearances.
According to UN data, there are currently 79 missing persons in Concordia, with 30 cases reported since the beginning of 2025. In Sinaloa, approximately 6,835 individuals have gone missing, out of a population of around three million. The UN petition attributed the surge in disappearances to the internal conflict within the Sinaloa cartel, triggered in September 2024.
The violence stems from a rift between factions loyal to Joaquín (El Chapo) Guzmán’s sons, known as Los Chapitos, and those aligned with Ismael (El Mayo) Zambada García’s son, La Mayiza, within the cartel. Federal Security and Citizen Protection Secretary Omar Harfuch has suggested possible links between the abduction of Vizsla’s employees and a group associated with Los Chapitos.