Asad Ismi: Guatemala's Fragile Peace

"Dandy", said U.S. President Eisenhower when informed in June 1954 that the CIA had overthrown the elected government of Jacobo Arbenz in Guatemala. The U.S. removed Arbenz for daring to implement land reform and replaced him with a string of military dictators who ensured that life for most Guatemalans would be far from dandy. Four decades of genocidal military rule followed the 1954 coup. The murderous peak was reached under General Rios Montt (1982-1983) who wiped out 400 villages. State terror produced a revolutionary movement in 1962 led by Turcios Lima and Yon Sosa, former army officers. In 1979, four guerrilla organizations coalesced into the National Revolutionary Unity of Guatemala (URNG). During the 36-year civil war, the army murdered or disappeared about 200,000 Guatemalans.

Frank LaRue is Director of the Centre for Human Rights Legal Action in Guatemala. He spoke in Toronto in March about the peace accords signed between the Guatemalan government and the URNG on December 29, 1996.

1. Do you think the accords will lead to genuine peace?

Frank LaRue: The accords per se, no. Peace has to be based first on truth and justice and that will be a major challenge. Will we be able to establish the rule of law in the country? And for that we have to deal with the worst violations of the past. A bad precedent coming out of this process has been the Amnesty Law which is a law passed by consensus and the other issue is that of exercising real democracy. One of the things we have gained from the peace process is a political space for participation; this is very important. But what is really at stake is whether we are able to maintain this space, to use it appropriately and to build a more participatory democracy.

2. Does the Amnesty mean that members of the Guatemalan military responsible for massive human rights violations will not be punished?

FL: That is not clear yet. We are challenging the Amnesty Law as a matter of principle because of the way it was drafted. Article 5 of the Amnesty says that there will be no criminal responsibility for those government authorities that committed a crime to prevent others from committing a crime, a political crime. We believe it is a travesty of law to say that the law can be violated by authorities in order to uphold the law or in other words that you can commit a crime to prevent a crime. That will never be acceptable anywhere in the world--that basic principle has to be rejected. On the other hand, I must admit that this law has something that other Amnesty laws in Latin America do not have which is an article of exclusion. Article 8 says that international crimes-- crimes against humanity and those that have no pardon should not be considered and it specifically quotes three: genocide, torture and disappearance.

3. There is also the related issue of the Truth Commission. Isn't it contradictory to have a Truth Commission and an amnesty at the same time?

FL: It is for us. The government does not see it that way. As a matter of fact, I think Truth Commissions are often established as an alternative to justice. This is a big debate within human rights. We see truth as the first step to reaching justice; they see truth as an alternative to justice. So you give the people truth so they're happy but then you pardon the criminal responsibility, you don't give justice and that is very clear. We are trying to reduce the scope of the amnesty law and say that the minimum amount of cases should fall under the amnesty and on the other hand in the Truth Commission we want to broaden the scope and have the maximum number of cases contemplated by the Truth Commission.

4. Has the peace agreement dealt with the economic issue that led to war--the concentration of land ownership?

FL: Not really. I have a theory of the origins of the war. We have talked a lot about how much socioeconomic issues were the ones that brought us to the conflict. In Guatemala, although socioeconomic issues are paramount, the real reason for the war was political. Guatemala had a flavour of democracy from 1944 to 1954 and people were beginning to modernize the Guatemalan state; in 1954 there was a CIA-sponsored coup and the political space was shut completely. From then on there was no space for dissent. Subsequent military governments supported by the United States kept on suffocating the Guatemalan people so in 1960 you had a reform movement within the military. The first coup was organized by young lieutenants and because that failed, that is when Turcios Lima and Yon Sosa formed the first guerrilla movement of the Sixties. So it came out of these young officers who were part of the democratic tradition of 1944-1954 and then begins the bloodbath of Guatemala because then the U.S. starts training the Guatemalan army in counterinsurgency tactics, rather effectively.

5. Have the PACs (Civil Defense Patrols set up by the army, which massacred villagers) really been demobilized?

FL: The PACs have been demobilized and so have the military commissioners. But in rural areas some of these people are still armed with their personal weapons so they're still thugs. They have gone from being PACs defended by the military to being gangs that extort money or intimidate people. There has been a significant reduction of their force but in some remote areas they are still around and difficult to contend with for the population which still feels very intimidated by them.

6. Can you tell us more about the Agreement on Indigenous Rights?

FL: It's a good agreement which sets a major precedent for Latin America. The fact that in such a racist society like Guatemala based on discrimination very similar to South Africa with the only exception that apartheid existed in an unofficial way in Guatemala, to have an accord that recognizes that this is multicultural state, a multilingual and multiethnic state, is a very important achievement. We should make sure that the indigenous Mayan population has access to the political structure and the political decision-making process.

7. The Arzu government has recently received aid pledges totalling $1.9 billion from different governments. You have urged that an improvement in the human rights situation be made a condition for the giving of international aid to Guatemala and this has not been done.

FL: We are in favour of international cooperation. Countries should contribute to the reconstruction of Guatemala and to the implementing of the peace accord but we would put conditions on it, human rights being the first one. There has to be a definite, substantial improvement in human rights. The second concerns compliance with the accords themselves; the donor countries could guarantee that the accords are being fulfilled progressively and the third condition is that the state be able to live up to the commitment of the Accords which means generating its own revenue and income which means tax reform. One of the key problems in Guatemala is that no one pays taxes and this is a state that is going through a constriction because it doesn't have any income--it has the lowest taxation rate in the hemisphere after Haiti.

8. Arzu has been saying that he is going to put the international aid Guatemala has been given, into health and education. Do you think that will happen?

FL: I don't think so. I don't see them moving in the direction of health and education. I do see some efforts towards modernizing the justice system but I don't see any major effort in health and education.

9. Violence and intimidation continue against members of human rights organizations, unions and peasant organizations. Between January and October 1996, there were 1,520 human rights violations which is a 25% increase over 1995. Do you see an improvement in the human rights situation after the accords?

FL: I see an improvement in the human rights situation in the sense that you don't have the dramatic number of public assassinations or you don't have massacres or disappearances. Human rights is still a major concern in different ways. Number one is the question of impunity. In those human rights violations that still exist or those that happened in the past, you don't see any justice being applied and that is a major problem. If there is no justice concerning these massive violations of the past including the massacres then why should we trust the justice system for the future.

10. And of course, linked to that is the dominant role of the United States in Guatemala especially that of the CIA since the 1954 coup. Given consistent U.S. support for genocidal regimes in Guatemala, what do you see as the future course of U.S.-Guatemalan relations?

FL: It's a touchy question. I would like to see a clear U.S. policy regarding the role of the Guatemalan military and I would also like to see what kind of relationship the U.S. and others including Canada establish with the Guatemalan military. If there is no serious effort directed at demilitarization, I don't think that we will reach democracy in Guatemala. The Guatemalan mlitary has to be seriously down-sized numerically but it also has to be down-sized politically; it has to stop playing the dominant political role that it has in the structure of the state. We do need a lot of international support for that and I don't see a clear policy coming from the United States. They are not giving military assistance but they are not putting conditions on the other forms of assistance either.

11. There is the question of corruption in the army. There have been reports that senior officers have been implicated in drug trafficking.

FL: And in car theft and kidnappings. When it's big organized crime and very sophisticated operations, it's all been organized by military officers and protected by officers. It is common.

12. It has been said that the URNG may have given up too much in the accords. Do you think this is true?

FL: The URNG lost their capacity to negotiate strongly in the last year. The negotiations, as a whole, produced relatively good accords with the exception of the Truth Commission. It is within the Arzu government that strangely you see the two parties growing closer and both of them concluded that time was against them and they both decided mutually to hasten the process. The conflict in Guatemala had already concluded since March 1996 because both parties had unilaterally declared a ceasefire which showed the degree of relationship and from then on you had positions of consensus between both parties. There has not been a serious debate going on between the government and the URNG during all of last year. You have a relatively successful negotiation with a URNG which is militarily weak but politically strong because of the negative image of the military amongst the Guatemalan people and internationally.

13. In El Salvador as in Guatemala, there has been no change in land distribution and after the signing of the Salvadoran peace agreement there was a dramatic rise in crime, stemming from widespread poverty, which has led to a high level of violence. Do you see the same happening in Guatemala?

FL: Tragically, yes. The Socioeconomic Accord is weak and the peace process has not solved economic problems especially the question of land. 70% of the land is owned by 2% of the people. The government has also not dealt with the enormous number of weapons in the country. Private police personnel outnumber the national police four to one. Many of these off-duty policemen will commit delinquent acts. So you have hired goon squads with access to lots of weapons which does create a violent atmosphere. We lack a strong police force to counter this so there will be a rise in violence in Guatemala. And this goes back to the crucial issue of demilitarization. Big, organized crime is normally tied to the military so unless the role of the military and its power is reduced, you will still have serious organized crime.

14. What do you see as Canada's role in helping Guatemala's transition to peace?

FL: Canada has always played a very important role politically and economically and is seen as a morally superior nation; it has to play a leading role in Guatemala. We are very happy to see Canada involved in the administration of justice programs and cooperating with local development communities in San Marcos. Canadian involvement has always been welcome; Canada sets a different tone and pace than other countries and has played a very positive role in Guatemala. Canadian NGOs [non-government organizations] should maintain the interest in Guatemala by giving information to the Canadian government. We are worried that with peace signed, people will forget about Guatemala, thinking that everything has been solved. We believe that signing the peace accords was an important but initial step. The real task of building peace begins now and we do need as much attention as before.

Published in:

Americas Update, May/June 1997

The Atkinsonian, October 1997


	GUATEMALA'S FRAGILE PEACE: An Interview with Frank LaRue

"Dandy", said U.S. President Eisenhower when informed in June 1954 that the CIA had overthrown the elected government of Jacobo Arbenz in Guatemala. The U.S. removed Arbenz for daring to implement land reform and replaced him with a string of military dictators who ensured that life for most Guatemalans would be far from dandy. Four decades of genocidal military rule followed the 1954 coup. The murderous peak was reached under General Rios Montt (1982-1983) who wiped out 400 villages. State terror produced a revolutionary movement in 1962 led by Turcios Lima and Yon Sosa, former army officers. In 1979, four guerrilla organizations coalesced into the National Revolutionary Unity of Guatemala (URNG). During the 36-year civil war, the army murdered or disappeared about 200,000 Guatemalans. Frank LaRue is Director of the Centre for Human Rights Legal Action in Guatemala. He spoke in Toronto in March about the peace accords signed between the Guatemalan government and the URNG on December 29, 1996. 1. Do you think the accords will lead to genuine peace? Frank LaRue: The accords per se, no. Peace has to be based first on truth and justice and that will be a major challenge. Will we be able to establish the rule of law in the country? And for that we have to deal with the worst violations of the past. A bad precedent coming out of this process has been the Amnesty Law which is a law passed by consensus and the other issue is that of exercising real democracy. One of the things we have gained from the peace process is a political space for participation; this is very important. But what is really at stake is whether we are able to maintain this space, to use it appropriately and to build a more participatory democracy. 2. Does the Amnesty mean that members of the Guatemalan military responsible for massive human rights violations will not be punished? FL: That is not clear yet. We are challenging the Amnesty Law as a matter of principle because of the way it was drafted. Article 5 of the Amnesty says that there will be no criminal responsibility for those government authorities that committed a crime to prevent others from committing a crime, a political crime. We believe it is a travesty of law to say that the law can be violated by authorities in order to uphold the law or in other words that you can commit a crime to prevent a crime. That will never be acceptable anywhere in the world--that basic principle has to be rejected. On the other hand, I must admit that this law has something that other Amnesty laws in Latin America do not have which is an article of exclusion. Article 8 says that international crimes-- crimes against humanity and those that have no pardon should not be considered and it specifically quotes three: genocide, torture and disappearance. 3. There is also the related issue of the Truth Commission. Isn't it contradictory to have a Truth Commission and an amnesty at the same time? FL: It is for us. The government does not see it that way. As a matter of fact, I think Truth Commissions are often established as an alternative to justice. This is a big debate within human rights. We see truth as the first step to reaching justice; they see truth as an alternative to justice. So you give the people truth so they're happy but then you pardon the criminal responsibility, you don't give justice and that is very clear. We are trying to reduce the scope of the amnesty law and say that the minimum amount of cases should fall under the amnesty and on the other hand in the Truth Commission we want to broaden the scope and have the maximum number of cases contemplated by the Truth Commission. 4. Has the peace agreement dealt with the economic issue that led to war--the concentration of land ownership? FL: Not really. I have a theory of the origins of the war. We have talked a lot about how much socioeconomic issues were the ones that brought us to the conflict. In Guatemala, although socioeconomic issues are paramount, the real reason for the war was political. Guatemala had a flavour of democracy from 1944 to 1954 and people were beginning to modernize the Guatemalan state; in 1954 there was a CIA-sponsored coup and the political space was shut completely. From then on there was no space for dissent. Subsequent military governments supported by the United States kept on suffocating the Guatemalan people so in 1960 you had a reform movement within the military. The first coup was organized by young lieutenants and because that failed, that is when Turcios Lima and Yon Sosa formed the first guerrilla movement of the Sixties. So it came out of these young officers who were part of the democratic tradition of 1944-1954 and then begins the bloodbath of Guatemala because then the U.S. starts training the Guatemalan army in counterinsurgency tactics, rather effectively. 5. Have the PACs (Civil Defense Patrols set up by the army, which massacred villagers) really been demobilized? FL: The PACs have been demobilized and so have the military commissioners. But in rural areas some of these people are still armed with their personal weapons so they're still thugs. They have gone from being PACs defended by the military to being gangs that extort money or intimidate people. There has been a significant reduction of their force but in some remote areas they are still around and difficult to contend with for the population which still feels very intimidated by them. 6. Can you tell us more about the Agreement on Indigenous Rights? FL: It's a good agreement which sets a major precedent for Latin America. The fact that in such a racist society like Guatemala based on discrimination very similar to South Africa with the only exception that apartheid existed in an unofficial way in Guatemala, to have an accord that recognizes that this is multicultural state, a multilingual and multiethnic state, is a very important achievement. We should make sure that the indigenous Mayan population has access to the political structure and the political decision-making process. 7. The Arzu government has recently received aid pledges totalling $1.9 billion from different governments. You have urged that an improvement in the human rights situation be made a condition for the giving of international aid to Guatemala and this has not been done. FL: We are in favour of international cooperation. Countries should contribute to the reconstruction of Guatemala and to the implementing of the peace accord but we would put conditions on it, human rights being the first one. There has to be a definite, substantial improvement in human rights. The second concerns compliance with the accords themselves; the donor countries could guarantee that the accords are being fulfilled progressively and the third condition is that the state be able to live up to the commitment of the Accords which means generating its own revenue and income which means tax reform. One of the key problems in Guatemala is that no one pays taxes and this is a state that is going through a constriction because it doesn't have any income--it has the lowest taxation rate in the hemisphere after Haiti. 8. Arzu has been saying that he is going to put the international aid Guatemala has been given, into health and education. Do you think that will happen? FL: I don't think so. I don't see them moving in the direction of health and education. I do see some efforts towards modernizing the justice system but I don't see any major effort in health and education. 9. Violence and intimidation continue against members of human rights organizations, unions and peasant organizations. Between January and October 1996, there were 1,520 human rights violations which is a 25% increase over 1995. Do you see an improvement in the human rights situation after the accords? FL: I see an improvement in the human rights situation in the sense that you don't have the dramatic number of public assassinations or you don't have massacres or disappearances. Human rights is still a major concern in different ways. Number one is the question of impunity. In those human rights violations that still exist or those that happened in the past, you don't see any justice being applied and that is a major problem. If there is no justice concerning these massive violations of the past including the massacres then why should we trust the justice system for the future. 10. And of course, linked to that is the dominant role of the United States in Guatemala especially that of the CIA since the 1954 coup. Given consistent U.S. support for genocidal regimes in Guatemala, what do you see as the future course of U.S.-Guatemalan relations? FL: It's a touchy question. I would like to see a clear U.S. policy regarding the role of the Guatemalan military and I would also like to see what kind of relationship the U.S. and others including Canada establish with the Guatemalan military. If there is no serious effort directed at demilitarization, I don't think that we will reach democracy in Guatemala. The Guatemalan mlitary has to be seriously down-sized numerically but it also has to be down-sized politically; it has to stop playing the dominant political role that it has in the structure of the state. We do need a lot of international support for that and I don't see a clear policy coming from the United States. They are not giving military assistance but they are not putting conditions on the other forms of assistance either. 11. There is the question of corruption in the army. There have been reports that senior officers have been implicated in drug trafficking. FL: And in car theft and kidnappings. When it's big organized crime and very sophisticated operations, it's all been organized by military officers and protected by officers. It is common. 12. It has been said that the URNG may have given up too much in the accords. Do you think this is true? FL: The URNG lost their capacity to negotiate strongly in the last year. The negotiations, as a whole, produced relatively good accords with the exception of the Truth Commission. It is within the Arzu government that strangely you see the two parties growing closer and both of them concluded that time was against them and they both decided mutually to hasten the process. The conflict in Guatemala had already concluded since March 1996 because both parties had unilaterally declared a ceasefire which showed the degree of relationship and from then on you had positions of consensus between both parties. There has not been a serious debate going on between the government and the URNG during all of last year. You have a relatively successful negotiation with a URNG which is militarily weak but politically strong because of the negative image of the military amongst the Guatemalan people and internationally. 13. In El Salvador as in Guatemala, there has been no change in land distribution and after the signing of the Salvadoran peace agreement there was a dramatic rise in crime, stemming from widespread poverty, which has led to a high level of violence. Do you see the same happening in Guatemala? FL: Tragically, yes. The Socioeconomic Accord is weak and the peace process has not solved economic problems especially the question of land. 70% of the land is owned by 2% of the people. The government has also not dealt with the enormous number of weapons in the country. Private police personnel outnumber the national police four to one. Many of these off-duty policemen will commit delinquent acts. So you have hired goon squads with access to lots of weapons which does create a violent atmosphere. We lack a strong police force to counter this so there will be a rise in violence in Guatemala. And this goes back to the crucial issue of demilitarization. Big, organized crime is normally tied to the military so unless the role of the military and its power is reduced, you will still have serious organized crime. 14. What do you see as Canada's role in helping Guatemala's transition to peace? FL: Canada has always played a very important role politically and economically and is seen as a morally superior nation; it has to play a leading role in Guatemala. We are very happy to see Canada involved in the administration of justice programs and cooperating with local development communities in San Marcos. Canadian involvement has always been welcome; Canada sets a different tone and pace than other countries and has played a very positive role in Guatemala. Canadian NGOs [non-government organizations] should maintain the interest in Guatemala by giving information to the Canadian government. We are worried that with peace signed, people will forget about Guatemala, thinking that everything has been solved. We believe that signing the peace accords was an important but initial step. The real task of building peace begins now and we do need as much attention as before. Published in: Americas Update, May/June 1997 The Atkinsonian, October 1997

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