The Church report calls on the government of President Alfonso Portillo to establish a commission with access to state archives, including records of the army, which maintains overweening power. There has been no response from army or government. Cabrera was one of the team which worked four years on a l998 study cataloguing hundreds of massacres and other violence. Within 48 hours of its ceremonial presentation, office director Bishop Juan Gerardi was discovered bludgeoned to death. It is nearly four years since guerrillas and government signed a peace treaty, but an atmosphere of distrust persists.
Relatives fear reprisals if they look for children taken by the army.
In the rural settlement where Luis Curruchich lives, families may know each other's histories and even help search for lost children. But in the tin-roofed squatters' houses clinging precariously to the deep canyons around Guatemala City, where thousands fled from the violence, people are much more guarded. Some of the separated children may not even be Guatemalan any more, but living as young Americans or Frenchmen. Cabrera feels the search for children should be a government priority, to help bring reconciliation. Beyond a healing sense of closure and reconciliation, the search for children could have enormous legal repercussions.