URGENT COMMUNIQUE from the Departmental Assembly of Huehuetenango in Defense of Territory (ADH) *Official Translation by NISGUA Spanish below It is with great concern that we share the unfortunate news that today, March 15, at 7:30 in the morning, Rubén Herrera, a member of the coordination of the ADH, [...]
Victoria Sanford is the director of the Lehman College Center for Human Rights and Peace Studies in New York. She is the author of Buried Secrets: Truth and Human Rights in Guatemala. In 2012, she testified as an expert witness in the Spanish Tribunal’s genocide case against Guatemalan generals [...]
FIRST TRIAL FOR GENOCIDE STILL SET TO BEGIN MARCH 19 APPEALS COURT'S RULING DOES NOT SUSPEND DEBATE Today, March 11th, we were notified of a constitutional injunction ("amparo") filed by the military officials José Efraín Ríos Montt and José Mauricio Rodríguez Sánchez, accused of genocide and crimes against humanity. [...]
PRIMER JUICIO POR GENOCIDIO CONTINÚA PARA EL 19 DE MARZORESOLUCIÓN DE LA SALA CUARTA NO SUSPENDE DEBATEHoy lunes 11 de marzo fuimos notificados de una acción constitucional de Amparo interpuesta por los militares José Efraín Ríos Montt y José Mauricio Rodríguez Sánchez, acusados de genocidio y delitos contra los deberes [...]
Last weekend, 93% of the population of Los Planes rejected Tahoe Resources' proposed Escobal project, voting NO to chemical mineral mining on their territory. This good-faith referendum, organized by local authorities, is the second of 26 community referenda plannedin the municipality of San Rafael Las Flores. The first referendum, [...]
Unofficial translation by NISGUAComunicado original en español¡In Defense of Life, Territory, Mother Earth and the collective Rights of our Peoples! “WE ARE ALL BARILLAS” No to the submission of the Guatemalan state to multinational companies. Yes to life.To: Our indigenous brothers and sisters around the worldAnd the national and international [...]
*URGENT COMMUNIQUE*To the national and international public, regarding the recent events in the municipality of Santa Cruz Barillas Huehuetenango, WE DECLARE:Yesterday, at around one o'clock in the afternoon, armed men ambushed three community leaders as they returned from the municipal center to their nearby community of Posa Verde, where the [...]
*COMUNICADO URGENTE*Ante la opinión pública nacional e internacional, ante los últimos acontecimientos sucedidos en el municipio de Santa Cruz Barillas Huehuetenango MANIFESTAMOS:El día de ayer a eso de la una de la tarde; hombres armados emboscaron a tres personas, líderes comunitarios; que retornaban de la cabecera municipal hacia su comunidad [...]
Participe en la acción urgente dirigida a Goldcorp - Versión en españolCanadian mining company with U.S. investors could leave indigenous communities with multi-million dollar bill to pay.We need your support to help defend the rights of indigenous peoples affected by mining in Guatemala's western highlands.On April 26, Goldcorp will hold [...]
The information below was translated from a press statement by CALDH (in Spanish below) Read Amnesty International's statementOn March 20, the First Tribunal for High Risk Cases in Guatemala sentenced 5 members of the Guatemalan military to 7,710 years in prison for the massacre of 256 people in the Plan [...]
Comunicado de CALDH - www.caldh.orgEl Centro para la Acción Legal en Derechos Humanos, CALDH, manifiesta su complacencia ante la reciente condena de un comisionado militar y cuatro ex patrulleros militares responsables de la masacre de la Aldea Plan de Sánchez, Rabinal, en julio de 1982 en donde fueron asesinadas más [...]
Versión en español On Thursday, January 26, 2012, in a preliminary hearing, General José Efraín Ríos Montt was linked to the ongoing legal process for genocide and crimes against humanity by the first justice for high risk cases, Carol Patricia Flores. Ríos Montt refused to make a statement. Despite [...]
Versión en español An initial court hearing for former General Efraín Ríos Montt, accused of genocide, took place after ten years of work by the Association for Justice and Reconciliation (AJR). The day after the hearing, ACOGUATE interviewed members of the AJR, accompanied by ACOGUATE since 2001.What do you all [...]
A personal reflection by Phil Neff, Guatemala Accompaniment Project Coordinator for NISGUAA cold evening fog had fallen over the Plaza of Human Rights outside Guatemala City's Court Tower, where two hundred survivors of massacres perpetrated by the Guatemalan Army waited, exhausted and anxious, for Judge Patricia Flores to deliver the [...]
2011: EL AÑO MÁS VIOLENTO CONTRA DEFENSORES Y DEFESORAS DE DERECHOS HUMANOSLa Unidad de Protección a Defensoras y Defensores de Derechos Humanos – Guatemala (UDEFEGUA), informa, que según nuestros registros, el año 2011, fue el año más violento en contra de defensores y defensoras de derechos humanos. Contabilizamos un total [...]
2011: The Most Violent Year for Human Rights DefendersThe Human Rights Defenders Protection Unit – Guatemala (Unidad de Protección a Defensoras y Defensores de Derechos Humanos – Guatemala; UDEFEGUA) reports that, according to our records, 2011 was the most violent year so far for human rights defenders. We counted a [...]
More than 28 years have passed since the massacre of more than 250 men, women, and children in the small farming community of Las Dos Erres, Petén. For 17 years, survivors and family members of victims have struggled to bring the perpetrators to justice, with the support of the [...]