Guatemala’s President Is Now in Jail. Some Americans Should Join Him.
Guatemala’s President Is Now in Jail. Some Americans Should Join Him.
An investigation into who authorized the U.S. military and intelligence agencies to equip, train, and assist the Guatemalan army in its war crimes should follow its president's trial for corruption.
By Jack Werner, September 23, 2015.
The former President of Guatemala, Otto Fernando Pérez Molina, has stepped down amidst corruption charges, after being formally indicted on September 3 for his role in the scandal now known as La Linea.
By far the best coverage of this case for non-Spanish speakers has come from Francisco Goldman in The New Yorker, who’s written a piece that at once captures the historic momentum of this indictment while encompassing the personal reflections of a seasoned journalist. It deserves to be read by all.
Underneath the story of corruption engulfing Pérez Molina as he currently awaits trial, there’s another more painful story that recapitulates Guatemalan history and the role of this former general in it.
I’m talking about the 1981-1983 genocide in Guatemala, which reached its bloodiest height in 1982 in the rural highlands of Guatemala. Efraín Ríos Montt, the military dictator of the country during these lost years, oversaw much of the violence directed towards the leftist insurgents and anyone thought to be collaborating with them, namely the Mayan Indians, who were mostly campesinos — or peasant farmers, the forbearers of Guatemalan history.
More:
http://fpif.org/guatemalas-president-is-now-in-jail-some-americans-should-join-him/