Mexico opened a memorial Friday honoring tens of thousands of victims of a brutal drug war, but the garden of towering steel walls has been rejected by some relatives of the dead and missing.
Built with funds seized from drug cartels, the memorial was built during the administration of president Felipe Calderon, whose six-year term ended in December and was marked by an escalation of the violence.
Although it was completed months ago, the $2.4 million monument was only unveiled on Friday in a park of the sprawling Mexican capital, well after Calderon left office.
“This memorial remembers not only those who are gone, but also those who are still here,” said Alejandro Marti, founder of the Mexico SOS group whose teenage son was murdered in 2008.
With President Enrique Pena Nieto traveling in Asia, the government was represented by Interior Minister Miguel Angel Osorio Chong, who is leading a new security strategy focused on reducing the daily violence plaguing the population.
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