Guatemala Bus Outrage

Some criminals have no shame.

A man who lost his wife and two of his children in this week’s bus bombing in the Guatemalan capital has fled his home after receiving extortion demands, the Survivors Foundation said Friday.

The criminals approached cab driver Jorge Cac on Wednesday during the funeral for his murdered kin, foundation director Norma Cruz said at a press conference.

Cac was told he had to hand over a portion of the money that humanitarian groups collected to pay for the funeral and defray the medical costs for another of the cabbie’s children who was hurt in Monday’s attack on the bus, Cruz said.

She said Cac has already abandoned his residence on the outskirts of Guatemala City.

Veterans on the Move

In Guatemala, thirteen or fourteen former members of the Self-Defense Patrols (PACS) active during the war were killed in a bus accident in between Tejutla and Concepcion Tutuapa in the Department of San Marcos west of Guatemala City.  Another forty-three were injured. 

According to witnesses and survivors, the driver was not familiar with the road.  He was also going excessively fast and lost control of the bus rounding a curve.  The brakes failed and the bus was sent off the road and down into a 164 ft. deep ravine (BBC, UPI, Herald Sun, Prensa Libre).

The paramilitaries were on their way to collect their salaries after having taken part in a government reforestation program.

There were about 60 passengers on the bus, all of them former members of the paramilitary civil patrols set up by the military to combat left-wing rebels during Guatemala's 1960-1996 internal conflict.

Hundreds of thousands of Guatemalans from rural communities were forced to join the civil patrols, and veterans have since campaigned to receive payment for their service.

The reforestation project the victims of the accident were working on was part of a government programme to create employment for ex-paramilitaries.

In El Salvador, on the other hand, disabled veterans from the war recently agreed to leave that Cathedral that they had been occupying since December 20.  Veterans from both the Armed Forces (ESAF) and the FMLN (though mostly from the former guerrillas) had been calling on the government to act on their proposal to extend pensions ($143-$230 monthly) to the mothers and fathers of roughly 7,000 soldiers and guerrillas killed during the war. 

While the protesters still seems upset the the new government, the Catholic Church, and the Human Rights Office for their general lack of support, the Funes administration has agreed to study the proposal (Nuevo Herald, Contra Punto).

When we talk about the civil wars in El Salvador and Guatemala, we tend to measure the human costs into terms of the dead and the disappeared.  We forget that there are thousands of people, if not millions, who carry the wounds of war with them on a daily basis.  That's less so when it comes of the families of the disappeared, but it's pretty accurate when we are referring to the soldiers from all sides who live each day missing limbs, PTSD, and other scars of war.

Alta Verapaz again

From the Guardian in the UK

Security forces detained 21 suspects and seized small planes and 150 weapons, including grenade launchers, in what authorities called a major blow to the Zetas, considered one of Mexico's bloodiest narco organisations.

"These individuals were not just preparing to confront the security forces, they were preparing to take control of the country," Guatemala's president, Alvaro Colom, told reporters. Drug gangs were "invading" central America to move contraband from Colombia to Mexico and the US, he said.

I don't want  to put too much behind this statement, but I've read it too many times.  If the Zetas were "preparing to take control of the country" and you were only able to detain 21 suspects in total (not even all Zetas), either you've done a lousy job or you're overestimating the Zetas.

For more skepticism on the Alta Verapaz operation (here's my post), I would encourage you to read this new piece from Annie Bird on  Guatemala: State of Siege, Two Steps Backwards.

Social movement organizations in Guatemala live first-hand the terrible violence, and know how desperately Guatemalans want something done to combat violence. However, organizations fear that handing over blanket powers to the very same forces that have shown, incident after incident, that they are pervasively compromised or controlled by organized crime networks, is not the path to turning back the siege of violence in Guatemala.

Community organizations and human rights activists point out that Alta Verapaz has one of the highest levels of agrarian conflict in Guatemala. Much of this conflict is between campesino and indigenous communities and large landholders, often with ties to organized crime that control and manipulate the justice system and the security forces; forces that could take advantage of a State of Siege to repress human rights and community defenders.

It is also significant that over the past several months, municipalities in Alta Verapaz have been carrying out community consultations, expressing their opposition to hydroelectric dam projects that are planned throughout Alta Verapaz, without the consent of affected Qeqchi communities. The State of Siege prohibits assembly, making such consultations impossible.

She also has information on Guatemala's new Attorney General and three decade history of organized crime.

El Salvador News

Tim has an update on the eviction of street vendors in San Salvador (here's the story from June), the country's slightly improving homicide rate, and a weak economy.  Just a few thoughts. 

First, while we mention these murder statistics each year, we have to remember the violence is not equally distributed throughout the entire country.  While it seems pretty obvious, some areas of each country are much safer than other areas.  That's why Ciudad Juarez can be the most dangerous city on the planet, but Mexico's overall numbers are not that alarming.  Likewise, the Department of Guatemala accounted for nearly 60% of the country's murders even though it possesses just over one-fifth of the entire population.   

Second, I'm not sure that there's much qualitative difference between a murder rate of 72.8 (Honduras), 71 (El Salvador), and 67.6 (Venezuela) per 100,000.

Third, while many of the murders are the result of gang on gang activity, too many are also attacks on journalists, mining activists and witnesses, public officials, and women.

Finally, projected economic growth of 2.5% is not that good even if attaining it will surpass anemic growth rates from 2009 (-3.3%) and 2010 (0.7-0.8%).  While those who intend to vote for the FMLN (36%)outnumber those who intend to vote ARENA (28%), the FMLN would probably feel much better if the economy could somehow hit 3% this year.

The good news is that with a slow economy and marginally improved security situation, 51% of all Salvadorans still support Funes - the same percentage he won with in 2009.

Guatemala Bus Bombing Update

Two leaders from the Little Sayco Criminal clique along with three other individuals are being held in connection with Monday's bus bombing that left seven people dead in Guatemala.

Gustavo Pirir and Eulogio Escobar managed the attack on the bus from the jail where they were being held prior to their transfer Wednesday to a maximum-security prison, the prosecutor said.

Pirir and Escobar are the leaders of a Mara 18 faction known as Little Sayco Criminal that is behind an extortion racket targeting bus companies in the western section of the capital, Lopez said...

"Gustavo Pirir managed and directed all the operations from jail, not just the extortion, but he also coordinated the attacks" on buses, the prosecutor said.

Pirir was involved romantically with Sonia Veliz, the 20-year-old woman arrested Tuesday for planting the bomb on the bus.

Veliz was "captured using a robot photo prepared with the testimony of a survivor of the attack," Lopez said.

Another jailed Mara 18 member, Carlos Rodriguez, detonated the bomb from prison using a cell phone, Lopez said.

Rodriguez, who was also transferred to a maximum-security prison on Wednesday, "communicated with other people outside (the prison) who made the bombs that he detonated from jail with a call," the prosecutor said.

Esvin Rolando Avendaño Monzón, a partner and ex director of the Rutas Qutzal, the transport compnay targeted in the attack, was the fifth person arrested.  The Public Prosecutor's office has accused Avendaño of conspiracy, racketeering, obstruction of transit, and money laundering. 

They say Avendaño was responsible for delivering the extortion payments from the bus company to the gang.  However, he never delivered the October, November and December payments.  Instead he deposited the payments in his own account.  The attack was ordered as a result of the non-payment.  (Siglo XXI, Prensa Libre).

Life Goes on in Alta Verapaz

From Al Jazeera's Christopher Arsenault comes a story on A Mayan fire ceremony for land and freedom

Santa Cruz, Guatemala - The road winds through a steep mountain pass, as our pick-up truck swerves around debris from rockslides on the way to a reclaimed farm in Alta Verapaz, Guatemala.

We are traveling to a large farm or finca that has been abandoned by absentee German landlords, after the main owner died in the 1970s. The peasants, who used to work for the landlord, now work for themselves.

Today, families on the Prima Vera farm are performing a Mayan fire ceremony, asking god- or the creator – for the right to stay.

They recently received an eviction notice, telling them to get off the land that sustains them.

The Siege in Alta Verapaz

There have been several recent news stories about the Zetas in Guatemala and the state of siege in Alta Verapaz.  So far,

police have arrested at least 22 "traffickers" and confiscated five small planes, 239 assault weapons, 28 vehicles and explosives in a series of raids...

I don't think that there is much evidence (yet?) of the siege having produced lasting calming effects and I don't think that we should expect any.  I hope that I am wrong, but given the strength of narcotraffickers in the region and the weakness of Guatemala's police, military, and political and judicial institutions, I am not optimistic.

Aside from my concerns that the operation in Alta Verapaz will be totally ineffective, Chris Arsenault writing for Al Jazeera reports on how some locals are skeptical that the operation was even launched to take on the Zetas.

No one disputes the power, corrupting influence or horrific violence projected by the cartels. "You could see them walking in the mall [in Coban] before the siege," says Cesar Bol, a leading activist with the National Indigenous and Campiseno Coordination Organisation (CONIC).

"They openly carried pistols on their belts, wore brand new clothes, drove brand new trucks and spoke with Mexican accents."

But in farming villages, church halls and independent research offices, there is deep scepticism about the government's actions.

"The state of siege is a strategy of the government to attack social movements," says Carlos Morales, who works for farmers' rights with the Union of Campiseno Organisations of Verapaz.

At least two activists, Chabil Utzaj and Pablo Sacrab, have been arrested in Alta Verapaz under the pre-text of the siege, another farmers' rights groups says.

Sitting beside bags of fertiliser and posters of the revolutionary Che Guevara in a warehouse-turned-office, Morales says the Zetas don't live in his municipality of Santa Cruz, a 15-minute drive from Coban.

He thinks the siege is staged and simply an excuse for repression, rather than a legitimate attempt to battle traffickers.

"There are agrarian conflicts in much of Alta Verapaz," he says. "The government is trying to silence groups organising for land reform and against mega-projects like hydro-electric dams and palm oil plantations."

While many urban Guatemalans do not share Morales's analysis, there is scepticism about why a state of emergency would be declared in Alta Verapaz, as it is not the country's most violent area.

On Monday, Interior Minister Carlos Menocal announced that in addition to the cash, suspects, and planes seized in the lat two weeks, the government has been able to disrupt the Zetas "base, their hiding place, their operations center in Alta Verapaz."  Menocal's quote would provide one reason why authorities conducted the siege in Alta Verapaz rather than the capital or other departments.

The Guatemalan Solidarity Project has more information on one of the indigenous leaders, Pablo Sacrab Pop, arrested during the siege.



Given Guatemala's history, people should be skeptical about the government's motivations and its capacity to carry out such a siege.  While I have no reason to doubt that the the central government's primary target is the Zetas, the siege also provides a perfect opportunity for some to use the siege to further their own economic interests by leading the police and military to target local labor, human rights, and indigenous community leaders.