Several hundred people chanted for the military to leave Ciudad Juarez, which has suffered more than 4,300 drug gang murders since troops were deployed in the city two years ago in a clampdown that has fanned turf wars between rival cartels.
Tempers flared in this manufacturing city on the U.S. border after gunmen burst into a teenage birthday party last month and killed 13 high school students and two adults.
“Go away, Calderon, resign,” shouted Luz Davila, who lost both her sons in the shooting. Davila broke through security during a visit by the president this week to attack him verbally over the incident.
Calderon was in Ciudad Juarez on Thursday to pledge money for social programs as a way to stem a culture of violence that goes back years in the city. Critics see him looking increasingly weak against the ruthless trafficking cartels.
Students dressed in army-style garb holding mock cardboard rifles were among black-clad protesters at Saturday’s march.
“We are not going to let them continue killing our sons, our youth, our daughters,” said Paula Flores, whose son was abducted and murdered a decade ago.
Midway into his six-year term, Calderon is still popular in Mexico but opinion polls show that a drug war death toll of more than 18,000 since he took power in late 2006 is undermining confidence in his vow to beat the cartels.
