MEXICO CITY, Mexico - February 13, 2011 - Mexicans took to the streets in their hundreds to protest a staggering surge in drug-related violent crime nationwide that claimed at least 45 lives in one weekend.
"No more violence, no more lack of safety, no more corrupt politicians, let's move ahead with citizen candidates," marchers on the touristy Paseo de la Reforma shouted after at least 45 people died in Monterrey and Guadalajara, and the northern state of Chihuahua.
Demonstrators marched to the Senate to unveil an appeal for tougher anti-drug laws.
The attacks were the latest deadly violence gripping Mexico's war on drugs, as the country's various criminal cartels struggle over turf and the government uses police and soldiers in an attempt to crush them.
From late Saturday into Sunday, 15 people were killed in Chihuahua state drug-related bloodletting, prosecutors said. Of the 15, nine people were slain in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico's deadliest city across from the U.S. city of El Paso, Texas.
Also in Chihuahua state, 11 people were slain in several separate murders in Ciudad Juarez, between late Friday and Saturday; and gunmen shot dead five men together in an additional group killing on a highway between Chihuahua city, the state capital, and Ciudad Juarez, according to police.
