Victims of Guatemalan bus fire were shot first

[Bacchus39]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20081110/ap_on_re_la_am_ca/lt_guatemala_bus_fire;_ylt=ArKNrpYEea6tL.yGIEXYVAC3IxIF

Victims of Guatemalan bus fire were shot first

Associated Press Writer Juan Carlos Llorca, Associated Press Writer – 39 mins ago AP – In this photo released by Guatemala Fire Department, the bodies of fifteen people lie on the ground after … GUATEMALA CITY – Prosecutors said Monday that 15 charred bodies found in a burned-out bus were shot before they were set on fire.

At least 14 of the dead were Nicaraguan, including the driver, said Attorney General Amilcar Velazquez.

The bus left Nicaragua with 16 passengers, but only 15 bodies were found after the bus burned on Saturday on an unpaved road in a mountain valley.

It is unclear was happened to the 16th passenger.

Police spokesman Donald Gonzalez said the killings may have been drug related. He said parts of the vehicle had been violently torn away, as if someone was looking for secret compartments.

Velazquez says bullets and shell casings were found at the scene, and authorities have confirmed the victims were shot, explaining why there were no signs that anyone tried to flee the burning vehicle. All the dead were found in their seats.

The bus was on a charter route that carried Nicaraguan vendors to Guatemala, where they would buy things to sell at home.

Driver Carlos Paiz had driven the same route every weekend for the past four years, according to his relative, Donald Sandoval, who said he didn't know why the bus was targeted.

"It was a bus that left from (Nicaragua) and anyone could get on," he said.

Guatemala has struggled with growing drug and gang violence.

In March, near where the bus was found, 11 people were killed in a gang fight in which several vehicles were torched.

And the charred bodies of three Salvadoran members of the Central American Parliament were found along a rural road in February 2007.

[Vogon_Glory]

1. The Narcos Are A Serious Threat to Civil Society

The international drug cartels are a serious threat to the development of democracy and true prosperity in Latin America. They have shown that they are every bit as ruthless as the neo-colonialist oligarchies were during the United Fruit Company's heyday and during the Cold War, and even more contemptuous of the idea of the rule of law and the idea of justice of the people by the people. A Latin America where a weakened US pulls back is a Pyhrric victory at best unless the drug cartels are crushed; the cartels have repeatedly shown that they are more than willing to fill the legal and political vacuum left by a weakened or discredited state like Guatemala or where they're ignored by the civil authorities like the PRI did during its last years of power and like Chavez seems to be blithely doing now in Venezuela.