Sting Supports Amnesty International's Campaign Against Thousands of Disappearances in Mexico

English musician Sting teamed up with Amnesty International's campaign to urge the Mexican government to investigate the thousands of people who have disappeared in the country.

Gordon Matthew Thomas Sumner, known professionally by his stage name Sting, met with the relatives of the missing individuals in Mexico's recent years, Amnesty International's website wrote.

"It is not hard to imagine the anguish and torment that families undergo when a loved one disappears, vanishes without trace or explanation, when attempts to find them or discover their fate are frustrated by the apparent indifference of the authorities to a situation that has become an epidemic in Mexico," said Sting, as quoted by the non-governmental organization's site.

The 64-year-old singer continued, "I met with some of the families, but they are just the tip of the iceberg, I call on the Mexican government to follow up on these cases far more vigorously, to find and prosecute those responsible and to prevent through legislation this scourge of disappearances and human rights abuses."

Sting performed in the city of Tequesquitengo on Saturday and dedicated his 1993 song "Fields of Gold" to all the missing people in the country, The Yucatan Times reported.

Erika Guevara Rosas, Americas Director at Amnesty International, said that nearly 27,000 people across Mexico have disappeared since late 2006, the organization noted. This includes last year's Ayotzinapa mass disappearance, where 43 male students from the Ayotzinapa Rural Teachers' College went missing in Iguala, Guerrero, Mexico after being attacked by police officials involved with a drug cartel.

"Anyone here is a potential target with authorities doing little or nothing to find them and punish those responsible," Rosas said, as quoted by Amnesty International's website. "We are enormously grateful to Sting for joining our efforts in finding justice for thousands of families, just as he did in Argentina and Chile in the past. Together, we trust we can make a huge difference."

According to UN News Centre, official statistics found that 98% of all crimes in Mexico remain unsolved, with the majority of them not even properly investigated.

Zeid Ra'ad Al Hussein, the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, said earlier this month that some violent cases are caused by the country's powerful and cruel organized crime groups, UN News Centre noted. But many enforced disappearances were allegedly carried out by Federal, State and municipal authorities, including the police and some army sectors, both of which are acting on their own benefit or in agreement with criminal groups.