The Winter 2024 edition of El Quetzal, from The Guatemala Human Rights Commission (GHRC), has recently been published. It features an interview with Juan Francisco Sandoval, who was the head of the Special Prosecutor’s Office Against Impunity (FECI) from 2015… Read More ›
Impunity
Ixil Genocide Trial Against Benedicto Lucas García Nears End
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… Read More ›
Ixil Dignity
Víctor Peña presented this photo essay in Spanish in March 2019, in El Faro. It is now translated in the lead-up to the verdict in the trial of retired Guatemalan General Benedicto Lucas García on the charge of genocide against… Read More ›
International organizations demand due process guarantees at key hearing for Jose Rubén Zamora’s release
The Washington Office on Latin America (WOLA) was a signatory, among many others, of a Joint Statement demanding due process at the review of journalist Jose Rubén Zamora’s detention. 19 international civil society organisations demand due process at the review… Read More ›
Judicial Elections Enter Decisive Phase
“The Commissions have not excluded from the process aspiring magistrates, judges, lawyers, prosecutors and magistrates who have participated in acts of corruption and who have been involved in the corruption of the judiciary.” The Guatemala Human Rights Commission/USA (GHRC) recently… Read More ›
The Voices Of Those Who Live Among Mountains
Resistance Of The Communities Of Guatemala Against Dispossession “We are Ral Ch’och, that is to say: we were born, we live and we are on our lands. We cannot go anywhere else other than our own.” Pascual Miranda, Río Cristalino… Read More ›
Guatemalan Women Fought for Democracy. Now They Have to Make It Work for Them.
Laura Carlsen writes in Z about the mobilisation of Indigenous people in defence of democracy, and the role of Indigenous women within that struggle. After the election of Bernardo Arévalo, the corrupt elites tried to turn back the clock and… Read More ›
“Arévalo’s every action faces prosecutors’ arbitrary scrutiny”
“Consuelo Porras uses fear, threats and harassment to pursue an anti-democratic agenda. No one is cornered here. If anything, I believe that the MP, with its own actions, demonstrates its desperation and cornering.” Yuliana Ramazzini writes in El Faro English… Read More ›
In defense of Atitlán Lake
María Guarchaj and Teresa Gonón write in Ojalá about the challenges facing communities that live by, and depend on, Lago Atitlán. While it is true that the lake has been suffering from environmental degradation, attempts to profit from technical responses… Read More ›
Attacks on Guatemala’s Anti-Corruption President Growing
Rights Action have reposted a piece by Alex Papadovassilakis that was originally published in InSight Crime. The piece presents a further view on the corruption of the Guatemalan judiciary, starting at the very top, and how it continues to hamper… Read More ›