Guatemalan authorities arrested the presumed leader of a Zetas cell in the region along the Mexican border, where the group's incursion has forced the displacement of local residents.
Seven were killed and some 40 wounded when security forces attacked a protest road blockade by Maya indigenous campesinos in the Guatemalan highlands.
Drug trafficking and violent crime in Central America and the Caribbean threaten the rule of law in those regions, according to a report by the UN Office of Drugs and Crime.
Charges were dropped against 10 campesino opponents of a hydro-electric project on Maya lands in Guatemala, but other leaders remain in prison and face death threats.
The US praised the decision of Guatemala’s Constitutional Court allowing former president Alfonso Portillo to be extradited to the US on charges of embezzling foreign donations.
Swiss prosecutors announced that Erwin Sperisen, former commander of Guatemala's National Police, was arrested in Geneva and will stand trial for extrajudicial killings.
A court in Guatemala City sentenced Pedro García Arredondo, former chief of the National Police, to 70 years in prison for the 1981 disappearance and torture of a university student.
The military forced 100 impoverished families to move out of land in Guatemala City where they’d lived since January—and removed them again when they tried to settle nearby.
Student protesters clashed with police in Guatemala’s capital after students occupied several campuses to oppose a right-wing “reform” of the country’s educational system.
UN Special Rapporteur of the human rights of migrants Felipe González Morales called for an independent investigation into the death of Jakelin Ameí Caal, a Guatemalan migrant child who died while in US Customs and Border Protection. Jakelin was in custody, along with her family and other migrants, after crossing the Mexico border. The factual causes leading up to her death are currently disputed. In the report, Morales stresses the importance of finding out what happened to Jakelin, stating that "if any officials are found responsible they should be held accountable." (Photo via Jurist)
Guatemala’s special anti-corruption Court for High Risk Crimes sentenced former vice president Roxana Baldetti to prison for 15 years and six months for her role in the so-called "Magic Water" scandal. The case concerned the awarding of an $18 million dollar contract to decontaminate Lake Amatitlán, an important water source for peasant communities. The contract went to Israeli firm M. Tarcic Engineering Ltd, which claimed it had a "special formula" that could clean the lake within months. An investigation revealed that the "formula" consisted of water, salt and chlorine. The Authority for the Sustainable Management of Lake Amatitlán (AMSA), establsihed to oversee the clean-up, documented illegal dumping of agricultural and municipal waste into the Río Villalobos, which empties into the lake. The UN-backed International Commission Against Impunity in Guatemala (CICIG) supported Guatemalan prosecutors in the conspiracy case against Baldetti. (Photo via EmisorasUnidas)
Four retired senior members of the Guatemalan military—including two high-ranking officers previously thought to be untouchable, former Army Chief of Staff Benedicto Lucas García and former chief of military intelligence Manuel Callejas y Callejas—were convicted of involvement in crimes against humanity. Three received a sentence of 58 years in prison, while one was sentenced to 33 years. The former officials faced charges arising from the detention, torture and sexual violation of Emma Molina Theissen, and the enforced disappearance of Emma’s 14-year-old brother Marco Antonio, in 1981. (Photo: Waging Nonviolence)
