Quiet Genocide: Guatemala 1981-1983 / Edition 1

by Etelle Higonnet

Overview

Quiet Genocide reviews the legal and historical case that genocide occurred in Guatemala in 1981-1983. It includes the full text of the genocide section of a United Nations sponsored Commission on Historical Clarification in Guatemala (CEH), brokered by the UN. In its final report, the CEH's rigorously reviewed abuses throughout the whole country. However, the memory of the Guatemalan dirty war, which predated the genocide and continued for over a decade of the heightened killing, has rapidly faded from international awareness.

The book renders a historical picture of the 1948 Genocide Convention and its unique status in international law. It reminds readers of the difficulty of preventing and punishing genocide as illustrated by the ongoing tragedy of Darfur; anddiscusses the evolution of international and hybrid tribunals to prosecute genocide along with war crimes and crimes against humanity. Then, it sketches a brief history of Guatemala with a focus on genocide It explores how internal and global politics were an expression of structural violence, designed to ensure cheap, abundant, and quiescent Indian labor for coffee planters.a The volume provides the commission's general considerations, legal definitions, methodology, period of analysis, and victim groups, and finds that genocide had been perpetrated against five indigenous Guatemalan groups.

By translating the genocide argument of the CEH into English and framing it in a lively, accessible way, this volume recovers the past, sets the record straight, and promotes accountability. This exploratory effort provides insight into the world of transitional justice and truth commissions, and valuable insights about how to engage with the question of genocide in the future. These findings shed light on a crucial and dark chapter of trans-American Cold War history, and will thus be of interest not only to scholars focused on Guatemala, but also on Central America and even more broadly, on the Cold War.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781412807968
Publisher:	Transaction Publishers
Publication date:	05/30/2009
Edition description:	New Edition
Pages:	258
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x (d)

About the Author

Etelle Higonnet has been a researcher for Human Rights Watch, the general project coordinator and Research Fellow at the International Human Rights Law Institute at De Paul University, and has worked in war crimes tribunals in Cambodia and Sierra Leone, as well as other human rights NGOs around the world. She is a graduate of Yale Law School. The Genocide Studies Program at Yale University, of which this is a project, conducts research, seminars and conferences on comparative, interdisciplinary, and policy issues relating to the phenomenon of genocide.

Table of Contents

List of Abbreviations vii

Glossary ix

Editor's Note Etelle Higonnet xi

Preface: Genocide in Guatemala Juan E. Méndez xiii

Politics by Other Means: Guatemala's Quiet Genocide Greg Grandin 1

English Translation of Sections of the Genocide Argument in the Final Report of the Guatemalan Commission for Historical Clarification, "Memory of Silence" 17

Genocide: General Considerations and Legal Definitions (par. 3198-3225) 17

General Policy (par. 3226-3243) 23

Region I (Maya Ixil People): Municipalities of San Juan Cotzal, Santa Maria Nebaj, and San Gaspar Chajul, Quiché (par. 3244-3361) 29

Region II (Maya Achí People): Municipality of Rabinal, Baja Verapaz (par. 3362-3431) 65

Region III (Maya K'iche' People): Municipality of Zacualpa, K'iché' (par. 3432-3492) 85

Region IV (Chuj Maya and Q'anjob'al Maya Peoples): Municipalities of Nentón, San Mateo Ixtatány Barillas, Huehuetenango (par. 3493-3580) 103

Final Conclusions to the Genocide Section 127

Criminal Prosecutions for Genocide in Guatemala: Advances and Obstacles in Transnational and Domestic Cases Naomi Roht-Arriaza 135

Appendix I Historical Clarification Commission: Mandate and Investigative Procedures 157

Appendix II Guatemala: Memory of Silence Recommendations 201

Works Cited 227

Contributors 235

Editorial Reviews

"[We] understand the immense value of initiatives such as this book, which broadcasts a reality that deserves to be known by the international community. This undertaking is of great value." —Rigoberta Menchú Tum, Nobel Peace Prize Winner

From the Publisher