Eleven years after the genocide trial of ex-dictator Efraín Ríos Montt, that of General Benedicto Lucas García, a former chief of the General Staff, began this April. In over 85 hearings, witnesses, victims, and experts have testified about the scorched-earth campaign Lucas oversaw in the Ixil region in the early 1980s. A ruling could be issued as early as the first weeks of November.
Yuliana Ramazzini wrote, recently, in El Faro English on the current trial of Benedicto Lucas García.
General Benedicto Lucas García, an emblematic military leader from the Guatemalan armed conflict, who since April is standing trial accused of carrying out genocide against the Maya Ixil people, has been indicted three times in the past decade for war crimes.
Lucas, head of the General Staff under the dictatorship of his brother, Romeo (1978-1982), was accused in 2016 of forced disappearance in the CREOMPAZ case, related to over 550 victims tied by hands and feet in clandestine graves, but in February the Constitutional Court upheld his exoneration alongside six fellow officers, leaving the crime unpunished.
Lucas was convicted in 2018 in the disappearance of 14-year-old Marco Antonio Molina Theissen and crimes against humanity and rape of Emma, Marco’s sister, receiving 58 years in prison, which were commuted to house arrest in 2023. In November 2019, he was accused of genocide with two co-defendants: César Octavio Noguera Argueta, who died in 2020, and Manuel Callejas y Callejas, who was declared unfit to stand trial in January due to Parkinson’s Disease.
On April 5, after over four years of delays, the trial began. Lucas, excused for medical reasons, took an oath through a livestream from the Military Hospital, where he has listened to more than 85 hearings. His lawyers advised him not to immediately testify because he would need more time to read the accusation. But he did venture his first comments: ”My wife is an Indigenous-German cruce [literally, “crossbreed”, but referring to mixed ancestry] and I am a protector of the campesino [Maya] race.”
The prosecution and defense presented their opening arguments. The Association for Justice and Reconciliation (AJR), an adhesive plaintiff, emphasized those of the prosecution: that the military campaign that Benedicto Lucas directed in the Ixil region was aimed mainly at extermination of Maya Ixil people.
The prosecution highlighted “two phases of military intervention —prevention and intervention— which were consented to, programmed, directed, ordered, and supervised by the now accused” and identified “[at least] 800 victims, 23 massacres, and at least 42 persons disappeared during the time the accused was in office,” stated an AJR attorney.
In addition, the investigation for the case turned up evidence of approximately 60 massacres, of which only 34 could be established in the expert, testimonial, and documentary evidence presented in court.
Raúl Nájera, investigator at the Human Rights Office of the Archdiocese of Guatemala (ODHAG), another of the plaintiff organizations, told El Faro English that the prosecution will also seek to prove Lucas’ “direct participation,” adding: “He [Lucas] supervised what was happening in the theater of operations specifically in the region.”
You can read the full article, with links and photos, here, Ixil Genocide Trial Against Benedicto Lucas García Nears End.
Categories: Genocide, Guatemala, Human Rights, Impunity, Indigenous peoples, Justice, Military, Racism, Violence
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