London, June 29 (RHC)-- Mexico’s police and military have routinely mistreated and sexually abused women during detention and interrogation, charging them with having links to drug cartels in a bid to boost drug-related arrests. 

In a shocking 60-page report, titled “Survive to the death,” released on Tuesday, the Britain-based rights group Amnesty International detailed interviews and testimonies of 100 women who reported that during their arrest and interrogation, they faced sexual torture by municipal, state or federal police officers or members of the Army and Navy.

Seventy-two of them said that they were sexually abused during or soon after their arrest, and 33 of them reported being raped.  Most of them said that they were beaten, suffocated with plastic bags to near asphyxiation, electro-shocked, touched and groped during detention and interrogations.  It added that all of these women had also experienced other forms of ill-treatment and psychological abuse, when they were held in federal prisons.

According to the report, most of these women were young low-income people from marginalized backgrounds, and in many cases they were illegally busted on fabricated charges of having links to drug cartels.  Ten women were also reportedly pregnant during the time of arrest while eight subsequently suffered a miscarriage.

The report went on to say that only for 22 reported cases the authorities opened investigations after 66 of these women reported the abuse to a judge or other authorities.