LOS ANGELES, CA (Catholic Online) - At the start of the gathering, federal Attorney General Marisela Morales denounced the "heinous" killings in Veracruz and stressed the need to "redouble efforts to combat all criminal manifestations."

The government "cannot, must not and never will allow these types of cowardly actions to go unpunished," Morales said, adding that they not only represent a "challenge to authorities but undermine our social structure."

She also referred to drug dealing as "the engine generating violence" in Mexico.
Drug-related violence has been on the rise in Veracruz, a coffee and sugar-growing state that had been seldom touched by the raging torrent arising from President Felipe Calderon's "war on drugs" until a few months ago.

A group of armed men hurled a grenade into a popular area of the city last month, killing one. In addition, 32 inmates escaped from state jails there this week.

The majority of the drug violence in Mexico had been located on its northern border that it shares with the United States. Fighting among drug cartels has since spread in recent months to other parts of the country as gangs fracture, old alliances dissolve and smugglers seek new transportation routes.
 
Thirty-five people with suspected links to drug gangs were murdered and their bodies left in two trucks and abandoned under a highway bridge in Boca del Rio, earlier this week.

A banner found near the dumped 35 bodies dumped said the killings were a warning to the Zetas, one of Mexico's most notorious drug gangs, which has been engaged in a turf war with more established rivals.

According to Al Jazeera's Franc Contreras, at the massacre in Veracruz, "the bodies were piled up ... showing marks of torture, while body parts were also found."

About 42,000 people have been killed since Felipe Calderon, the Mexican president, launched his war on drug gangs in late 2006.

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