A Mexican artist has created an artwork in memory of children killed in a US airstrike on a school in the southern Iranian city of Minab, using butterflies, schoolbooks and a rising sun to portray lost childhoods and dreams that, she says, should not be forgotten.

María Xitcat presented the piece, titled Butterflies of Minab, to Iran’s ambassador in Mexico, Abolfazl Pasandideh, during a visit to the Iranian Embassy in Mexico City on Tuesday.

Made from paper, cardboard, and recycled materials, the artwork commemorates the victims of the attack on the Shajareh Tayyebeh elementary school.

Xitcat became visibly emotional as she spoke about the children, expressing hope that her message would reach their bereaved mothers.

The artwork depicts children transforming into butterflies and flying toward a sun above Iran. The school and the inscription “Minab 168” appear at the bottom, recalling the reported death toll. Books and school supplies evoke the ordinary childhood activities that the victims should have been able to enjoy.

Xitcat said the work was inspired by an event that should never have happened.

War, she argued, can destroy bodies and material things, but it cannot erase the dreams and stories that live on in families and in the hearts of parents who have lost their children.

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For the artist, the piece is more than a memorial. It is an attempt to ensure that the children’s names remain in the public consciousness and that their deaths do not become another forgotten episode of war.

Xitcat, who previously worked in cybernetics engineering, has developed an artistic practice centered on giving discarded materials a new life.

In Butterflies of Minab, that approach carries a symbolic meaning: just as waste materials can be transformed into something meaningful, the children’s memories must be protected from oblivion.

“I hope my message reaches the mothers of Minab,” was the sentiment she conveyed during the presentation.

Pasandideh, for his part, thanked the artist for her gesture, saying the work held immense value because it had been created with genuine feeling.

He described Minab as a shared human tragedy and warned against allowing the killing of children and other civilians to become normalized.

The ambassador also called for the international community to demand accountability for the deaths, saying victims’ suffering should not disappear amid political disputes and the wider turmoil of war.

The February 28 strike on the Shajareh Tayyebeh School occurred on the first day of the US-Israeli military aggression against Iran, marking the war’s deadliest attack on civilians.

Iranian officials put the death toll at 168, including 120 students and 26 teachers. More than 110 people were also wounded.

Reporting by US media, including The New York Times, has examined evidence concerning the strike and the possible use of US Tomahawk missiles. Questions about targeting decisions and responsibility have intensified calls for an independent investigation.

Through her artwork, Xitcat has sought to carry the memory of the children beyond Iran’s borders. Her butterflies cannot ease the families’ loss, but they offer a message of solidarity across continents: the lives of children should never be forgotten, and civilian deaths must never be treated as inevitable costs of war.