Guatemala: 8 ex-military figures to face trial over killings

[Judi Lynn]

Source: Associated Press

Guatemala: 8 ex-military figures to face trial over killings

Jun 7, 5:55 PM EDT

GUATEMALA CITY (AP) -- Eight former members of Guatemala's military were detained and will go on trial on charges of forced disappearances and crimes against humanity dating to killings in the country's 36-year civil war, authorities said Tuesday.

In a court hearing, judge Claudet Dominguez ordered that proceedings begin against the ex-soldiers in connection with massacres committed during the 1960-1996 conflict.

The killings are related to more than 565 human remains found in mass graves in western Guatemala, and the victims are believed to have been killed by soldiers under the command of the suspects.

. . .

At least 245,000 people were killed or disappeared during the Central American nation's civil war, according to the United Nations.

Read more: http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/L/LT_GUATEMALA_PAST_CRIMES?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2016-06-07-16-52-34

[WhiteTara]

1. I'm glad that there is some justice.

I would feel better if *co went to the Hague and was tried for their war crimes. Too bad Poppy is so old, he will never go to trial or Kissinger either.

That number represents at least that many families destroyed.

[Judi Lynn]

3. Glad to see your point.People usually don't take the time to recognize what the numbers really mean.

The suffering, tortured spirits, destroyed lives of their loved ones matter so much, as well. Their concern, despair over the victims would tear them apart. All done for greed by people using less politically powerful people to terrorize and slaughter the most helpless ones.

Just because it can be done. There's no challenge in harming the helpless, just the ruthless exercise of power, muscle flexing for haters.

[WhiteTara]

4. I can't even imagine the suffering the families

go through still. To think that it went on for 36 years is mind numbing.

[Judi Lynn]

2. A "killing field" in the Americas: US policy in Guatemala

A "killing field" in the Americas:
US policy in Guatemala

The reality of Guatemala

Guatemala, with 10 million people, is the most populous country in Central America. It is run by an oligarchy of wealthy landowners and big business interests that reap the country's agricultural and commercial rewards at the expense of the rest of the population. The country has been headed by military dictators and figurehead-presidents. Ultimate control belongs to the Army.

Guatemala is a country without social or economic justice, especially for the 6 million indigenous Mayan Indians who make up the majority of the population. There is a marked disparity in income distribution, and poverty is pervasive. On coffee plantations, peasants, descendants of the ancient Maya, live in concentration camp-like conditions, as de facto slaves. 40% of the indigenous people have no access to health care, and 60% have no access to safe drinking water. Education in rural areas is non-existent, with the result that 50% of the people are illiterate. Half of the country's children suffer from malnutrition. Every day in Guatemala, a country in which everything grows, people go hungry.

The real power in Guatemala is in the hands of the Army, and that power has been used to violently control the people, resulting in the worst human rights record in the hemisphere. During more than 30 years of civil war, over 150,000 Guatemalans have been killed or disappeared, tens-of-thousands have been forced to flee to Mexico, 1 million have been displaced inside the country, and more than 440 Indian villages have been destroyed. 75,000 widows and 250,000 orphans have been produced out of the carnage. And, for more than four decades, the United States government has consistently supported the Guatemalan Army and the ruling class in their policies of repression.

. . .

United Fruit Company

Under dictator Jorqe Ubico (1931-1944), American-owned United Fruit Company (UFC) gained control of forty-two percent of Guatemala's land, and was exempted from taxes and import duties. The three main enterprises in Guatemala -- United Fruit Company, International Railways of Central America, and Empress Electrica -- were American-owned (and controlled by United Fruit Company). Seventy-seven percent of all exports went to the US and sixty-five percent of imports came from the US.

More:
http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/US_ThirdWorld/US_Guat.html

[WhiteTara]

5. So everytime I eat a piece of fruit from

Guatemala, I'm adding to the misery of the people. I'll have to watch my origin label closely.

[Judi Lynn]

6. United Fruit changed its name to "Chiquita" at some point, maybe too much notoriety attached to U.F.

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[font size=1]
This painting by Diego Rivera, “Gloriosa Victoria,” tells the story of the 1954 overthrow of the democratically elected Jacobo Arbenz gov’t. Coup Colonel Carlos Castillo Armas greets secretary of state John Foster Dulles, who holds a bomb with the face of Eisenhower, surrounded by people who were murdered in the coup. To his left is U.S. ambassador John Peurifoy with military officers and CIA director Allen W. Dulles whispering in his brother’s ear. On the right, the archbishop of Guatemala, Mariano Rossell Arellano blesses the act, while Guatemalans protest.
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Guatemala: Bodies for Bananas, pg. 135-137

In similar fashion, the tragedy of modern Guatemala owes its origins to U.S. foreign policy. A garrison state for more than forty years, Guatemala was home to the longest and bloodiest civil war in Central American history. The roots of that war go back to an almost-forgotten CIA-sponsored coup in 1954, which overthrew a democratically elected president.

Throughout the early part of the century, Guatemalan presidents faithfully protected the interests of one landowner above all others, the United Fruit Company. President Jorge Ubico, who ruled the country from 1931-1944, surpassed all his predecessors in the favors he bestowed on UFCO. . . .

Ubico forced Guatemala’s huge population of landless Mayans to work on government projects in lieu of paying taxes. He made all Indians carry passbooks and used vagrancy laws to compel them to work for the big landowners. As for Ubico’s penchant for jailing opponents and stamping out dissent, Washington simply ignored it so long as U.S. investment in the country flourished.

Ubico, like all the region’s dictators, eventually aroused the population against him. In 1944, a coalition of middle-class professionals, teachers and junior officers, many of them inspired by Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal liberalism, launched a democracy movement. The movement won the backing of the country’s growing trade unions and rapidly turned into a popular uprising that forced Ubico to resign.

More:
http://zinnedproject.org/materials/harvest-of-empire-a-history-of-latinos-in-america/

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Map from 1951, United Fruits. They also sold pineapples in the US
at a price lower than everyone else's in order to get market security. [/center]