Sobrevivientes de Guatemala

If you’re under 17, don’t read this post! More murder, following rape and torture, of women, the primary victims of violence in Guatemala. As I posted here, organized crime, drugs, and other excuses for turf wars make Guatemala a place of daily terror, particularly for women. 565 killed in 2006; 2007 registers 322 assassinations already. According to Norma Cruz (at right), director of La Fundación Sobrevivientes (female survivors of Guatemala), organized crime is responsible for 30% of these murders. Hiding out in a safe house where the only open space is a terrace fenced in with aluminum siding and covered with barbed wire that’s electrified at night, typical victims include a 14-year-old who witnessed the murder of her brother and boyfriend and a 43-year-old grandmother of 4 who organized her neighbors in a poor village to buy pipes and a pump rather than buy water from a quasi-racketeer. After housing members of the Spanish NGO that’s helping with the project, Paula received a call threatening the murder of her family members, one by one, if she didn’t pay up, thinking her Spanish visitors had given her money. The caller told her not to bother notifying the police, of which there are only 6 per 90,000 inhabitants, because they’d already been bought. So her entire extended family fled, and she’s holed up at Sobrevivientes. Similar extortion attempts and death threats have people fleeing the country in numbers equivalent to those during the civil war (1960-1996), which killed 200,000 people. Meanwhile, in this country of ethnic and socio-economic inequality, 1992-Nobel-Peace-Prize winner Rigoberta Menchú is still campaigning in Maya country (elections are today), despite the murder of 7 supporters during the campaign and being credited with only 5% of intended votes.

Thai voters approve new constitution

Thai voters gave themselves a new constitution Sunday, bringing military rule closer to an end. Almost a year ago, a military junta ousted the popularly elected Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra. In exile in London, Thaksin has been charged with corruption in Thailand and many leaders of his party, Thai Rak Thai, were judged guilty of election fraud and have been banned from politics for 5 years. Called “the first step in moving forward to full democracy” by the junta-appointed Prime Minister Surayud Chulanont, the new constitution, approved by perhaps as many as 70% of voters, provides for democracy but gives bureaucracy and the military greater influence than electoral politics. Some voters are simply relieved to be moving on, while others, primarily among rural voters who supported Thaksin, oppose the constitution as a “vote to endorse the coup” that won’t do anything for the poor. Social and political divisions subsist, of course, and election battles are likely to be fierce. Former senator Kraisak Choonhavan predicts aggressive, even nondemocratic campaigning, saying Thailand is "not in for a pretty time". Let's hope this doesn't forbode election violence like that seen in Guatemala, where the body count of 26 I reported here is now up to 40, with Rigoberta Menchú's party losing several people last week.

Elections more violent than war

So says Álvaro Colom, the leading presidential candidate in the bloodiest campaign season in the history of Guatemala. Guatemala’s 36-year civil war ended in 1996, but street violence remains a part of daily life. Elections bring an increase in violence as not only traffickers, but rogue soldiers and paramilitary groups, street gangs and smugglers all vie for influence along with the regular candidates. This year’s “political violence” is said to be different, its goal being to put drug traffickers or their allies into political office. This makes sense, as Guatemala is increasingly important as a transit point for the 60-90% of South American cocaine entering the US. So far this campaign season, 26 people have been killed, including 7 congressmen and a number of political activists, in a total of 61 reported attacks on both candidates and political activists. To avoid ambushes, Colom uses a helicopter, a doctor experienced in treating bullet wounds at his side. Not mere paranoia, more people of Colom’s party have been attacked than others, and Colom’s uncle Manuel Colom Argueta was shot dead while leading the 1979 presidential race.
Other candidates include former dictator Efraín Ríos Montt, whose arrest was requested by the US Congress in April and is the subject of a warrant issued by a Spanish judge based on complaints filed by Rigoberta Menchú (right). A Quiche Indian and also a candidate, Menchú earned the 1992 Nobel Peace Prize for her work on behalf of the indigenous communities that suffered the worst of the violence during Guatemala’s civil war. She also filed the complaint in Spain that led to the Guatemalan generals judgment. If elected, Menchú would be at once the first indigenous person and the first woman president. And she would no doubt support the International Commission Against Impunity, the future of which Grace O’Malley updates below.