Members of the security forces and government-backed armed groups were allegedly responsible for more than a hundred extrajudicial executions and scores of cases of torture, ill-treatment and ''disappearance'' for short periods; hundreds of people received death threats. Victims included street children, journalists, lawyers, public prosecutors and witnesses, trade unionists, human rights defenders, priests and land activists. Little progress was made in investigating thousands of past and present human rights violations. Two men were executed by firing-squad when the death penalty was applied in Guatemala for the first time in 13 years.
In January, a new government took office under President Alvaro Arzú Irigoyen. In his inaugural speech, the President recognized the need for the state to fight impunity in order to fulfil its duty to protect human rights.
In June, Congress approved new legislation enabling cases of human rights violations perpetrated by members of the army to be transferred from military to civilian courts.
The government and the armed opposition Guatemalan National Revolutionary Unit agreed a cease-fire in March. un-brokered peace negotiations between them continued throughout the year, and a final peace agreement was concluded at the end of December.
In August, the demobilization began of more than 300,000 members of the government-backed armed groups, or civil patrols, which had been responsible for gross human rights violations such as ''disappearances'', torture and extrajudicial executions during the 1980s and 1990s. Although civil patrol members were allegedly demobilized, cases of death threats against people who refused to join the civil patrols continued to be reported.
Criminal violence escalated. Scores of kidnappings for extortion, involving members of the security forces and, in some cases, members of armed opposition groups, were reported.
In April, the un Commission on Human Rights passed a resolution expressing concern that serious human rights violations persisted in Guatemala and situations of impunity continued to exist. It also expressed concern at the lack of progress made in investigating cases of human rights violations. These concerns were reiterated in statements and reports by the Misión de las Naciones Unidas para la verificacion de derechos humanos en Guatemala (minugua), un Mission for Guatemala, and the un Independent Expert on Guatemala. minugua's mandate was extended to the end of the year and the un Independent Expert was asked to submit a new report on the human rights situation in Guatemala to the un Commission on Human Rights in March 1997.
In December, the Guatemalan Congress approved a Law of National Reconciliation, which recognized the right to reparation for victims of human rights violations and charged the Commission for Historical Clarification with establishing ''the historic truth about the armed conflict''. Following concerns raised by Amnesty International and other local and international organizations, the final text of the law was amended so that immunity from prosecution would not apply in cases of forced ''disappearance'', torture and genocide. Amnesty International remained concerned that members of the security forces responsible for extrajudicial executions could still be granted immunity from prosecution.
Members of the security forces and government-backed armed groups were allegedly responsible for more than a hundred extrajudicial executions.
Information came to light regarding the involvement of new vigilante groups, acting in collaboration with members of the security forces, in the killing of members of juvenile gangs and petty criminals. The victims had been shot point-blank in the head, and the bodies, frequently with the hands tied, showed signs of stabbing and torture. Gilmar Fernando Miculux Tuctuc, detained in Guatemala City on 26 July 1995, was found dead the next day with six bullet wounds in his body. He had been detained by members of the Guardia de Honor, military guards, who interrogated him about criminal activities in the area and then handed him over to a vigilante group, Los guardianes de la noche, night vigilantes. Investigations into his killing during 1996 were obstructed by members of the armed forces, who refused to hand over crucial information to minugua.
There were reports of killings of street children by members of the security forces. Sixteen-year-old Ronald Raúl Ramos was beaten and then killed in September by a member of the Guardia de Hacienda, Treasury Police, in Tecún Umán, department of San Marcos. According to witnesses, the police officer shot Ronald Raúl Ramos in the forehead with a rifle. Investigations were initiated by the Public Ministry but by the end of the year no one had been detained
A pattern of intimidation against journalists reporting on human rights, impunity and the involvement of the security forces in corruption and organized crime emerged during the first six months of the year. In February, Estuardo Vinicio Pacheco Méndez, a journalist with Radio Sonora, was abducted by four men and drugged. He was held for around four hours, during which time he was beaten, kicked, burnt on the chest with cigarettes and the soles of his feet were cut. His assailants told him he was only being released as a warning to other journalists. The abduction was apparently motivated by Estuardo Vinicio Pacheco's investigations into alleged criminal activities of members of the security forces. He continued to receive death threats after his release and fled the country shortly afterwards.
Efforts by judges, lawyers, prosecutors and witnesses to break the legacy of impunity by bringing members of the armed forces to account for their actions met with systematic resistance, manifested in killings and death threats. Otto Leonel Hernández, a witness to the abduction and killing of Lucina Cárdenas in November 1995, allegedly perpetrated by members of the security forces operating in collaboration with criminal gangs, was kidnapped in June in the city of Quelzatenango and tortured for six days before being released. In March, a member of the armed forces had been charged and detained in connection with the killing of Lucina Cárdenas.
Witnesses and prosecutors involved in investigations into the Xamán massacre (see Amnesty International Report 1996) were also subjected to harassment and threats. In March, the then Attorney General, Ramses Cuestas, acknowledged that state prosecutors from the Public Ministry were receiving three or four death threats every month and were frequently attacked. minugua investigated similar allegations and reported that in one case, a prosecutor who had been threatened was later killed. Another prosecutor was forced to leave the country after receiving death threats.
Two investigators from the Public Ministry were killed in May on a road to the Salvadoran border, in an area frequented by members of the security forces allegedly involved in organized crime. Their deaths were believed to relate to investigations they were conducting into the possible involvement of members of the security forces in murders on the same road of a Salvadoran citizen and son of a Salvadoran parliamentarian in April, and of a Russian diplomat in May.
In November, attorney Abraham Méndez García left the country temporarily following a series of death threats. He was in charge of investigations into the killings of newspaper owner Jorge Carpio Nicolle and three others (seeAmnesty International Report 1994).
Trade unionists were also targeted for attack. In September, two unidentified men shot at Víctor Hugo Durán, Secretary General of the Sindicato General de Trabajadores de Guatel ''22 de Febrero'', ''22 February'' General Trade Union of Guatel Workers, as he was driving between Guatemala City and Villanueva. He escaped unharmed. The next day, unidentified gunmen sprayed bullets at Víctor Hugo Durán's house in the municipality of Villanueva. Two weeks later, three other members of the same trade union were threatened. Víctor Hugo Durán and his fellow trade unionists were campaigning against the privatization of Guatel, the public telecommunications company, which has historic links to military intelligence.
Many human rights defenders were also subjected to harassment and intimidation. In May, María Tuyuc Velásquez, a member of an indigenous women's organization, the Coordinadora Nacional de Viudas de Guatemala, National Coordinating Committee of Widows of Guatemala, was seized outside the organization's offices by a man in plain clothes who repeatedly beat, threatened and sexually assaulted her. A few days earlier, several unidentified men attempted to kidnap two other members of the same organization, Josefa Ventura and Sebastiana Hernández. The organization believed these attacks and threats related to a public march organized as part of their campaign in support of conscientious objection to military service.
In June, members of the community of Todos Santos in the northern department of Huehuetenango were threatened by two civil patrol commanders who interrupted a community gathering, accusing all the people present of being guerrillas and drawing up a list of their names. The commanders had apparently mistaken the community gathering for a meeting of a newly formed human rights committee.
More than 10 people, including members of the security forces, were killed in the context of violent land disputes. Land activists and members of the Church assisting those involved in land disputes were subjected to death threats and harassment by members of the security forces and private guards. Father Daniel Joseph Vogt received persistent death threats because of his community work in Rubelpec, municipality of El Estor, department of Izabal. Other members of the parish were also threatened and accused of being guerrillas. In another case in March in San Roque, Génova, Quelzatenango, more than 60 bullets were fired at the house of Raúl Juárez López, a land activist working with the Coordinadora Nacional Indígena y Campesina, National Indigenous and Peasant Coordinating Committee, by a group of individuals who allegedly included members of the military intelligence unit, the g-2.
Little progress was made in clarifying the extrajudicial execution of tens of thousands of Guatemalans during the army's counter-insurgency campaign of the late 1970s and early 1980s, or in bringing those responsible to justice. In August, the first case of its kind to reach the courts was suspended after the accused civil patrol members reportedly requested amnesty under Decree Law 08-86 (see Amnesty International Report 1987). The case concerned the massacres in Agua Fria, El Quiché department, and Rio Negro, Baja Verapaz department, in 1982, in which at least 240 people were killed.
Government officials continued to obstruct efforts to exhume the bodies of victims of human rights violations buried in mass graves. New estimates calculated a total of more than 500 graves. At least 27 legal complaints concerning clandestine cemeteries in Rabinal, Baja Verapaz, were lodged with the Public Ministry between 1994 and 1995. Of those reported, only a few had been excavated by the end of 1996. In no case had exhumations led to the trial of those responsible for authorizing, planning or carrying out the killings. Those conducting exhumations were also subjected to death threats and intimidation.
Further information came to light regarding the involvement of the us Central Intelligence Agency (cia) in past human rights violations in Guatemala. In a report published in June, the us Intelligence Oversight Board (iob) alleged that in the early 1990s Guatemalan cia agents had ordered, planned, or participated in serious human rights violations such as extrajudicial execution, torture and kidnapping, and that the cia's headquarters, the Directorate of Operations, had been aware of these crimes. The report confirmed that Guatemalan cia agents had also engaged in acts of intimidation and concealment of human right violations. In the case of us nun Diana Ortiz (see Amnesty International Report 1990), no new information was provided by the iob because the case was allegedly still under investigation.
The first legal executions in more than 13 years took place in September. Pedro Castillo Mendoza and Roberto Girón were executed by firing-squad for the rape and murder of a child in April 1993. The executions were shown on national television and included images of the prisoners being shot in the head after the firing-squad's first volley failed to kill one of them.
Amnesty International repeatedly called on the Guatemalan authorities to carry out full and impartial inquiries into past and new human rights violations. This call was reiterated in two memoranda submitted to the government in August, expressing concern about an amnesty law or any other measure which might grant impunity to the perpetrators of gross human rights violations. The memoranda also expressed concern about the ambiguity of the mandate of the Clarification Commission which was expected to begin work on looking into human rights violations once the peace negotiations had concluded (see Amnesty International Report 1995). By the end of the year Amnesty International had received no reply to either memorandum.
Amnesty International delegates visited the country on three occasions, collecting testimonies from victims and witnesses to human rights violations, and holding meetings with government officials.
In July, Amnesty International appealed to President Alvaro Arzú Irigoyen to commute the death sentences of Pedro Castillo Mendoza and Roberto Girón.

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