Día De Los Muertos Campaign Wants To #EndMigrantDeaths At The U.S.-Mexico Border

Arizona's Colibrí Center for Human Rights is bringing attention to deaths at the border by tying them to the Mexican holiday honoring the dead.

Colibrí Center for Human Rights based out of Tucson, Arizona launched the #EndMigrantDeaths campaign on Dia De Los Muertos asking people to change their social media profile photo to someone who has died on the border.

Each photo has the person’s name, age, where they were from, and when they died.

Organizers said they’re hoping to highlight the harsh journeys, violence, human rights violations, and policies that lead to migrant deaths and separate families.

"We hope to call attention to the urgent human rights crisis on the U.S.-México border, where border enforcement and militarization has caused thousands to lose their lives," Colibrí said in a statement.

Dia de los Muertos is a Mexican holiday that has grown in popularity in the U.S. celebrating the lives of loved ones who have died.

“In the spirit of Dia de los Muertos we’re trying to honor those who passed,” said Reyna Araibi, the group's outreach coordinator.

Often times, Araibi said, people focus on the numbers and not the migrants who died. They hope their efforts will humanize the hundreds of people who died on the border.

Colibrí, which helps identify human remains on the border, said at least 6,330 people have died in the areas between the United States and Mexico since 1998.

Araibi said the organization has records for more than 2,500 missing people, and the Pima County Office of the Medical Examiner, which handles examinations for most of Southern Arizona, has records for nearly 900 unidentified remains believed to be migrants.

“We wont save any lives at the border until we recognize as a country that there are lives worth saving,” Araibi told BuzzFeed News.