One year after the Guatemala Constitutional Court (CC) ordered the Guatemalan State to consult with the Xinca people on the issue of the El Escobal mine in San Rafael Las Flores, Santa Rosa, ACOGUATE has written on the order and… Read More ›
Indigenous peoples
State of Siege extended by Guatemalan Congress
NISGUA reports that, on October 10, the Guatemalan Congress approved Jimmy Morales’ proposal to extend the state of siege in six departments for another 30 days. The 30-day state of siege imposes a night-time curfew in the northeastern provinces of… Read More ›
Who Benefits if the Guatemalan Congress Passes a Blanket Amnesty?
As Jo-Marie Burt and Paolo Estrada point out in the International Justice Monitor website, the Guatemala Congress is looking to give a full-blown amnesty for genocide and crimes against humanity and to free all those already convicted. Here, they… Read More ›
Killings Of Guatemala’s Indigenous Activists Raise Specter Of Human Rights Crisis
María Martin recently wrote on NPR For three days last week, thousands of Guatemalans blocked roads and major highways to protest the Central American country’s slide toward a constitutional crisis. The protest organizers included groups that have long… Read More ›
Bishop Gerardi was killed 20 years ago in Guatemala. The search for justice continues today.
By Jackie McVicar (published in America Magazine) “Monsignor Gerardi was a person who didn’t only relate with people in the poorest regions, not only with those most excluded,” says Nery Rodenas, but who also “sought reconciliation, peace and to recognize… Read More ›
How indigenous women who survived Guatemala’s conflict are fighting for justice
By Juliette Doman, published in The Conversation. In February 2016, Guatemalan women survivors and the alliance of organisations supporting them successfully prosecuted two former members of the Guatemalan military for domestic and sexual slavery in the groundbreaking Sepur Zarco trial…. Read More ›
Efraín Ríos Montt is dead
Efraín Ríos Montt, former dictator and leader of the coup d’etat in 1982, died this past Easter Sunday. He was under house arrest as his case was being heard again regarding the genocide carried out against the Ixil people during… Read More ›
‘I Am Here Seeking Justice’
Earlier this year we posted a link to a video from Plaza Pública on the Sepur Zarco case and, of the seeking of justice. The video. with English subtitles, by Juliette Doman, is available here and, again, there is nothing… Read More ›
Indigenous weavers organize for collective intellectual property rights
A woman weaves in Santiago Atitlan, Sololá, Guatemala using a traditional backstrap loom. (WNV/Jeff Abbott) On July 9, Kaqchikel Maya weavers in Guatemala gathered in the town of Santiago Sacatepéquez’s central park to celebrate a small victory in their struggle… Read More ›
Court Ratifies Historic Sepur Zarco Sexual Violence Judgment
The High Risk Appellate Court upheld the historic Sepur Zarco judgment this week after unanimously rejecting the three appeals presented by the defense counsel of the two military officials convicted last February in the case. The judges read the summary… Read More ›