From: rich@pencil.cs.missouri.edu (Rich Winkel)
Subject: Guatemala Human Rights Update Dec 14, 1992
Followup-To: alt.activism.d
Originator: rich@pencil.cs.missouri.edu
Organization: PACH
Date: Thu, 24 Dec 1992 08:29:51 GMT

/** reg.guatemala: 137.0 **/
** Topic: HRU#50 Dec 14, 1992 **
** Written  6:25 am  Dec 22, 1992 by ghrc in cdp:reg.guatemala **

                  GHRC/USA Human Rights Update*
                      PEACENET Version #50
                        December 14, 1992


CASE UPDATES

ATTORNEY GENERAL FILES APPEAL TO REVOKE AMILCAR MNDEZ' LIBERTY 
On November 23, acting Attorney General Edgar Tuna Valladares
filed an appeal before the court, attempting to overturn Judge
Juan Francisco Prez Mu$oz' recent decision to grant provisional
liberty to Amilcar Mndez, director of the Council of Ethnic
Communities Runujel Junam (CERJ). (See Peacenet Update #46). 
Popular organizations and CERJ leaders have reported that
judicial officials are being pressured to revoke Mndez'
provisional liberty.
     Mndez is accused of supplying a pamphlet bomb (an explosive
device that causes a shower of pamphlets) to two CERJ members who
were arrested for supposedly intending to distribute Guatemalan
National Revolutionary Unity (URNG) propaganda.  He stood trial
on November 22 and was granted provisional freedom on the grounds
that the evidence to convict him was insufficient.  Mndez
reported that since the trial, however, seven more charges have
been leveled against him, accusing him of threatening civil
patrollers. 

CAMPESINOS OF CAJOL~ STILL WITHOUT LAND  Five-hundred families
from Cajol , Quezaltenango, who were evicted several months ago
from the Pampas de Horizante finca (ranch or plantation), still
have nowhere to live.  The fincas the Institute of Agrarian
Reform (INTA) has offered the campesinos (peasants or farmers),
being smaller than sixty-one acres, do not fulfill the
campesinos' requirements.  Enrique Ortega Taracena, the president
of INTA, said the government would buy an adequate finca to give
to the families of Cajol , and the campesinos would pay for the
land within a period of ten years.

JUDGE LILIAN V~SQUEZ THREATENED WITH ARREST  A warrant for the
arrest of Judge Lilian V squez, the former governor of Izabal,
was issued by the Sixth Criminal Court.  The charges against her
include contempt for the executive branch of the government
(specifically, President Serrano), a violation of article 142 of
the Penal Code.  
     V squez had reported to the Guatemalan Congress that she had
been dismissed from her post as governor because she did not
endorse the construction of Las Escobas port, which would be used
to receive toxic waste.  President Serrano reportedly called the
governor's office to tell V squez not to interfere in affairs
that were already decided.  According to V squez, Serrano also
told her that her only job was to follow orders.  V squez had
also reported to Congress that a nephew and a cousin of President
Serrano's had taken possession of the documents of the Choc"n
Machacas finca, a national reserve, and planned to evict six-
hundred families from the land (see Peacenet Update #48).

DRUG DEALERS FREED  The First Court of Zacapa, claiming a lack of
evidence, freed five members of the cuartel de Zacapa drug ring. 
Residents of Zacapa are concerned for the safety of several
people who reported the activities of the drug ring.  Zacapa
residents said it was strange that the drug dealers were freed on
lack of evidence, since they were arrested and found to be in
possession of military equipment shortly after they had killed
three people.  The dealers had also confessed to thirty-one
assassinations.

EXTRAJUDICIAL EXECUTIONS

On December 8, city bus driver WALTER GODINEZ JUAREZ (43) was
shot to death when several unidentified men whom he was driving
in a Mercedes Benz van opened fire on him with a machine gun. 
The attack occurred at approximately 7:00 P.M., at the entrance
of La Aurora international airport in Guatemala City.  The
vehicle was carrying several other passengers, who were not
injured.

OTHER HUMAN RIGHTS VIOLATIONS

JOURNALIST WOUNDED BY SOLDIERS  OMAR CANO HERRERA, a journalist
with the daily newspaper Siglo XXI, suffered a broken nose and
bruises when he was attacked by an angry mob of soldiers and
people involved in illegal tree-tapping and logging.  The attack
occurred in a gum tappers' camp called Paso Caballos, as Cano
Herrera was investigating the illegal felling of trees in the
Maya biosphere in El Petn.  Cano Herrera said two specialists
from the National Council of Protected Areas (CONAP) and an
employee of the Institute of Anthropology and History were also
assaulted.  
     According to CONAP specialists, similar incidents occurred
last year.  A group of soldiers under the command of a lieutenant
Ramos told lumber contrabandists that a delegation of CONAP
members and Treasury Police were going to conduct an inspection
in the Maya biosphere.  In June, the contrabandists, assisted by
members of the army, destroyed one of the inspection team's
vehicles, and in October they set fire to a CONAP camp in the
same location where the recent attacks occurred.  Spencer Ortiz,
the head of investigations for CONAP, who was also attacked,
declared that "indisputably, the soldiers, the contrabandists,
and the woodcutters work together."
     The print media and national grass-roots and human rights
organizations vehemently protested the attack on Cano Herrera. 
The National Council for the Defense of Journalists' Human Rights
(CNPDHP) said in a communique that the organization 
deplored the illegal detention and physical and psychological
tortures Cano suffered at the hands of his aggressors, "criminal
loggers who acted with the support and complacency of the
national authorities present."  The CNPDHP asked the Guatemalan
government to end the abuse of power, impunity, and aggression
against the national press.

WIDESPREAD TREE FELLING  Congresswoman Arabela Castro reported
that since Decree 72-92 went into effect, authorizing the sale by
public auction of wood found cut and abandoned in El Petn, a
large number of trees are being cut in the Maya biosphere.  The
Union of Petn Gum Tappers also criticized Decree 72-92, which is
causing illegal tree felling in El Petn to continue.

WORKERS DEMAND BENEFITS  Salom Por"n Figueroa, Secundino
Paniagua, and Rugo Carballo, members of the Pecuaria Guatemalteca
Company's (PEGUSA) ad hoc workers committee reported that the
company has not paid them the benefits it owes them.  The company
closed down on September 1, and workers are expecting their
benefits to be canceled.  The members of the ad hoc committee
have asked the Ministry of Labor to intervene to resolve their
demand.

CAMPESINO LEADER TARGET OF ABDUCTION ATTEMPT  Damian Bail, the
leader of the campesinos of Cajol  (see Case Updates) reported
that unidentified individuals tried to abduct him on December 12
as he was walking near the center of Guatemala City.

CONGRESSMAN THREATENED  Congressman MIGUEL ANGEL MONTEPEQUE,
secretary of the Guatemala Reform Party (PREG) is being
threatened, intimidated, and coerced, his party reported.  PREG
said these threats are related to Dr. Montepeque's recent public
denouncements of corruption and abuses of power by some civil
servants and government employees.

OTHER INFORMATION

RIGOBERTA MENCH~ RECEIVES NOBEL PRIZE  Rigoberta Mench# invited
Monseigneur Quezada Toru$o -- mediator of the peace talks between
the URNG and the Guatemalan government -- to the Nobel Peace
Prize award ceremony, held in Oslo, Norway on December 10.   
     Monseigneur Quezado Toru$o, in his capacity as mediator, and
Commandant Rolando Mor n, of the URNG, attended the ceremony. 
Delegates of the Guatemalan government were absent.  Mench# said
she hoped to be able to maintain a dialogue with President
Serrano.
     Meanwhile, the Secretary General of the United Nations,
Boutros Boutros-Ghali, named Mench# UN "ambassador of good will"
for 1993, the International Year of Indigenous Peoples.

OIT EXPERTS CONFIRM WORK SITUATION  Members of a special mission
of the International Organization of Labor (OIT), headquartered
in Geneva, met with Guatemalan Congressman Ren Ra!z Hern ndez,
the president of the Congressional Commission of Labor and Social
Security.  During the meeting it was pointed out that Guatemala
had ratified only twenty-four of the one-hundred-seventy-three
international labor agreements adopted by the OIT.  During their
stay in the country, OIT experts will request information on
workers rights violations.
BOMB EXPLODES IN HOSPITAL  A powerful bomb exploded on December 2
in the regional hospital of Zacapa.  No one was reported injured,
but hospital patients had to be evacuated.

REPORTERS PROTEST  In spite of a November 30 march in which
journalists submitted a list of requests to the Guatemalan
government, President Serrano has launched an attack on the
press.  The Secretary of Presidential Public Relations has been
conducting a publicity campaign, accusing the journalists of
lying, lacking respect for the President, and being
"destabilizers."  Reporters responded that, with such statements,
the President was demonstrating the disdain he feels for the
people whose mission is to inform the nine-million inhabitants of
Guatemala.
     Reporters in different communications media in Guatemala
City wore black arm bands as a sign of mourning and protest for
the statements President Serrano and other government officials
have made against journalists.
     The National Council of Journalists' Defense (recently
created and composed of the most important press organizations in
the country) in a show of solidarity with the guild that has been
continually attacked, said that freedom of the press has been won
at the cost of blood and that "the press reflects the reality of
the country, which is chaotic, and is not responsible for and
does not invent those facts." 

SANTIAGO ATITL~N MASSACRE COMMEMORATED  On December 2, residents
of Santiago Atitl n commemorated the December 2, 1990 army
massacre of thirteen indigenous citizens of their community.  As
a result of the massacre, the people of Santiago Atitl n
requested the withdrawal of the army and the National Police and
created their own security committee, an accomplishment they
celebrated by carrying the torch of peace from Guatemala City to
Santiago Atitl n.

MARCH TO PROTEST REPRESSION  On December 10, leaders of grass-
roots organizations and the Union of Popular and Labor Action
(UASP) marched to protest the increase in government repression
against popular groups.  The protest marked the first of a series
of peaceful demonstrations that will take place during the
International Year of Indigenous Peoples.  The protest also
coincided with International Human Rights Day and the awarding of
the Nobel Peace Prize to Rigoberta Mench#.

INDE WORKERS MARCH  Approximately 1500 workers of the National
Institute of Electricity (INDE) marched through the main streets
of Guatemala City to Congress to protest the announced increase
in the price of electrical energy service. 

TRANSPORTATION IN PETN  Since late November, the Association of
United Transportation Workers of El Petn (ATUC) has been
blocking the passage of trucks carrying petroleum toward the
Transversal del Norte highway.  The workers' aim is to pressure
the petroleum company operating in the region to pay the
municipalities royalties and a tax for extracting crude oil from
the subsoil in El Petn.  The president of the fuel company,
Emilio Sosa Le"n, has refused to negotiate with the transport
workers.

GROUPS CRITICIZE ARMY  The Groups Arising From Repression and
Impunity denied the army's statements that the existence of
clandestine cemeteries reflects the barbarities committed by the
guerrillas.  A spokesman of the groups said the accusations were
"false and slanderous, to try to cover up the proof of genocide"
committed by the army.




The Guatemala Human Rights Commission/USA monitors the human
rights situation in Guatemala and provides information to various
constituencies in the United States and to a limited extent
abroad.  Information in the Guatemala Human Rights Update is
compiled from a variety of international sources, including the
Comisi"n de Derechos Humanos de Guatemala/Mexico (Guatemalan
Human Rights Commission/Mexico), Americas Watch, Amnesty
International and Inforpress.  Information is also gathered from
reports and alerts from groups in Guatemala, including the
Archbishop's Human Rights Office, the Council of Ethnic
Communities Runujel Junam (CERJ), labor unions, the University
Students Association (AEU), the Conference of Religious of
Guatemala (CONFREGUA) and the Mutual Support Group of Relatives
of the Disappeared (GAM).  

* Every two weeks, two PEACENET Updates are combined to form the
Guatemala Human Rights Update, which is mailed first class to
hundreds of organizations and individuals.  That publication
includes all the information in the PEACENET versions--with
infrequent addenda and corrections--and a list of suggested
actions.  To subscribe to the Guatemala Human Rights Update send
$30 (yearly subscription) to GHRC/USA at: 3321 12th Street NE,
Washington DC, 20017.  Or call (202) 529-6599 or fax (202) 526-
4611 for more information.

** End of text from cdp:reg.guatemala **

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