/* Written  7:47 PM  Oct 31, 1991 by cerisea in igc:reg.guatemala */
/* ---------- "Cerigua Weekly Briefs" ---------- */
WEEKLY BRIEFS OCTOBER 20 - 26, 1991

Negotiations Hit Impasse on Human Rights

The Guatemalan government, the army and the Guatemalan
National Revolutionary Unity (URNG) renewed discussions
October 21-23 on human rights.  No agreements, partial or
otherwise, were reached owing to serious differences,
according to Mediator Bishop Rodolfo Quezada of the National
Reconciliation Commission (CNR).  Quezada and United Nations
observer Francesc Vendrell will try to use mechanisms agreed
on during the talks to try to break the deadlock on the
human rights issue.  What methods will be used is not known,
but Vendrell expressed hope about getting the dialog back on
track.  He said concrete measures are necessary and not
ambiguous formulas.

URNG Commander Pablo Monsanto said the issue is not an easy
one to address because of the current state of human rights
in Guatemala.  He said the rebels will not accept the
government's proposal to "wipe the slate clean and start
anew" on the human rights issue:  "this would be a betrayal
of the Guatemalan people and of ourselves," Monsanto said in
an interview with the Mexican daily El Financiero.  Monsanto
rejected government charges that violations of human rights
were a result of the armed conflict.  The rebel commander
said campesino laborers were tortured and murdered for
fighting for their rights even before the guerrilla forces
existed.

The URNG's eleven-point human rights proposal includes
international monitoring and verification, the creation of a
Truth and Justice Commission, as well as the dismantling of
clandestine repressive apparatus.  After five months of
talks, negotiators have been unable to get past the first
item - democratization and human rights - on the eleven-
point peace agenda.  President Jorge Serrano said the URNG
is intransigent and some rebel proposals are
unconstitutional.  "Guatemala is a state with a strong and
solid democratic system and we will conduct all negotiations
within the law," said Serrano.

Teresa Bolanos, Mario Permuth and Alfonso Cabrera were also
present during the talks as representatives for the CNR. The
government negotiating team, headed by Chief Presidential
Aide Manuel Conde, included Development Minister Manolo
Bendfeldt, Interior Minister Fernando Hurtado and special
presidential advisors Ernesto Vitteri, Amilcar Burgos and
Luis Asensio.  Representing the army were Brigade General
Jose Domingo Garcia Samayoa, Deputy Armed Forces Chief of
Staff;  Brigade General Mario Enriquez, Commander of the
Honor Guard Barracks (tanks and artillery); Brigade General
Marco Antonio Gonzalez Taracena, Chief of Military
Intelligence, the G-2;  Colonel Julio Balconi, Commander of
Military Mobile Police.  The full URNG General Command were
present - Gaspar Ilom, Rolando Moran, Carlos Gonzalez and
Pablo Monsanto - along with the URNG Political- Diplomatic
team.

Bishop: Government Must Respect Human Rights

Peace Mediator Bishop Rodolfo Quezada said it will be the
government's duty to immediately implement any agreement to
protect human rights.  When asked about reaching peace,
Quezada said that peace cannot be understood as just an end
to the armed conflict.  Peace is the fruit of justice and
solidarity, he said, and the reasons that caused the war
must be addressed in order to solve the crisis.  Quezada
called on those in disagreement with the negotiation process
to "leave aside personal positions, privileges and power in
order to give way to peace."

Andres Giron: Army is Hindering Peace Talks

Following three separate high-level discussions on human
rights with no accord, Andres Giron said that as long as the
army does not respect human rights, it will continue to
prevent any agreement with the guerrillas.  Giron,
Congressional Human Rights Commission Chairman, says the
army is the worst human rights violator in Guatemala and
requested that both the congressional commission and victims
of violence be allowed to participate in the peace talks.

Rigoberta Menchu Asks for Prosecution of Cerezo and Serrano

Ex-president Vinicio Cerezo and current leader Jorge Serrano
are responsible for the bloodshed in Guatemala and should
face judgment, said Quiche leader Rigoberta Menchu. "Neither
Cerezo nor Serrano are in a position legally, morally or
politically to deny they're responsibility for the violence
in Guatemala," when they both have acted as commander in
chief of the armed forces, she said, according to the
Mexican daily El Dia.  "Both Cerezo and Serrano promised the
international community that there would be full respect for
human rights and there hasn't," said Menchu.  The Quiche
activist donated $30,000 to the 500 Years of Indigenous,
Black and Popular Resistance Conference in Quezaltenango.
The funds were awarded to her last year as part of her 1990
UNESCO Prize for Peace Education.

De Leon Demands Firing of National Police Chief

Human Rights Ombudsman Ramiro de Leon has charged National
Police Chief Mario Paiz with torturing three prisoners.  He
is calling his resignation and criminal prosecution. Colonel
Paiz, in a joint operation with military intelligence,
oversaw the arrest and torture of Carlos Rosales, Francisco
Castillo and Ezequiel Trujillo.  The three men were forced
to confess to the murders of two police officers and two
students.  Following an investigation based on complaints
filed by the prisoners, De Leon and Interior Minister
Fernando Hurtado demanded that Paiz and his subordinates be
fired and sanctioned.  The human rights official asked
Hurtado to conduct an immediate investigation "so that all,
not just one, but all of those responsible be tried in the
courts."

Refugees are Going Home to Guatemala

The Permanent Commissions (CCPP) of Guatemalan refugees
living in Mexico met with the Guatemalan government and UN
officials to discuss the refugees' return to Guatemala next
year.  In a joint communique October 21, representatives
said the return will take place with ongoing communication
through the UN Mediating Body, which is made up of members
of the United Nations High Commission on Refugees (ACNUR)
and the United Nations Program for Development (PNUD).
Refugees called on the international community to support
the return and economic integration back into their country
after ten years of exile in Mexico.

New Resistance Communities Emerge in Peten

On October 22, ladinos and indigenous campesinos publicly
announced the formation of the Popular Resistance
Communities of the Peten (CPRP).  After over ten years of
fleeing government extermination campaigns and the loss of
hundreds of lives to death squads and massacres, the Peten
communities are demanding recognition as displaced civilian
populations and are calling on the army to withdraw from the
area and to cease the bombing and killing.  They have
requested protection from international humanitarian
organizations, the United Nations Human Rights Commission
and the International Red Cross.

The CPRP communique indicated that from June 3-17, the army
launched the "Lacandona Offensive '91" against the Peten
communities and went on to kill Mexican citizens living in
Guatemalan territory.  During that same offensive,
Guatemalan soldiers crossed into the Mexican state of
Tabasco kidnapping Mexican citizen Joaquin Lopez who has not
been seen since.

Human Rights Statistics Grim

The Mutual Support Group for the Relatives of the
Disappeared (GAM) reported that in the last sixteen months
there have been 2,074 extrajudicial executions and 328
forced disappearances, according to the Mexican daily El
Dia.  In just the first three months of 1991, unknown
assailants murdered 561 victims and disappeared 90 others.

GAM said the government has done nothing to investigate
crimes by civil patrollers (PAC).  According to Prensa
Libre, the human rights organization said that PAC Chief
Santos Coj, who was recently reported to have escaped jail
with police assistance, was never in fact in prison as he
had been sighted in the streets of Santa Cruz Quiche. Santos
Coj is charged with 50 human rights crimes and has dodged
arrest for over two years.  GAM president Nineth Garcia said
that fifty GAM members who are residents of Tunaja, Quiche
have received death threats.  Fourteen of those threatened
are witnesses in cases against Santos Coj.

Children Victimized by Illness, Hunger and Drugs

Seventy-six percent of Guatemalans suffer from poverty with
half the country's income concentrated among only 10% of the
population, said UNICEF representative Thierry Del Rue,
according to the Mexican daily Excelsior.  Thirty-two
children die every day from diarrhea and other intestinal
illnesses while 62% of pregnant women receive no pre-natal
care. The infant mortality rate is one of the highest in the
world with 102 deaths per 1000 of children under five.
UNICEF statistics show that 76% of children under five are
malnourished with 36% suffering from serious malnutrition.
The report estimated that by 1995, the population will grow
to 10.6 million people with 4.7 million persons under the
age of 14 and 1.8 million children under five, according to
radio newscast Guatemala Flash.

Security forces captured twenty minors under the influence
of glue fumes and marijuana and charged them with
intoxication and theft, according to a radio broadcast over
El Independiente.  The children ranged in age from seven to
14.

Massacre in Baja Verapaz

Nine persons died and three were wounded in a massacre of
the Rosales Avila family on October 18 in El Volcancito
Cubulco, Baja Verapaz, according to radio Patrullaje
Informativo.  El Grafico reported that among the dead were
four children, two women, and a 77 year old man.  Fourteen
blood-stained machetes were left by the more than twenty
killers who fled the scene.  The Mexican daily El Dia said
that a former Guatemalan military intelligence officer Julio
Cesar Hernandez was arrested for the massacre.

According to Guatemala Flash, Interior Vice Minister Cesar
Villalta said the murders occurred over land disputes
between neighbors in El Volcancito and that six of the
attackers had been identified.  Television Notisiete
interviewed survivor Dolores Rosales who said 25 men with
revolvers and machetes robbed them.  When questioned about a
dispute over land, Rosales said that the land belonged to
someone else and her family had nothing.  The twenty year-
old woman, who was left for dead by the assailants, is in a
hospital with machete wounds on her head and face, arms, and
other parts of her body.  Patrullaje Informativo reported
that five year-old survivor Hilaria Rosales Garcia, who does
not speak Spanish, is also in the hospital with eighteen
stitches in her head from a machete wound.

Families to Bury Dead

The Victims of Repression and Impunity called on the
Guatemalan public and the international community to
participate in the "Burial Against Impunity" when families
will inter the bodies of 27 relatives recently found in
clandestine graves near the town of Chontala in the district
of Chichicastenango, province of Quiche.  A caravan will
leave Guatemala City on October 29 and will make stops along
the way in the provinces of Chimaltenango, Solola, and will
end in Chichicastenango, Quiche.  A religious service and
burial will be held there for those "who gave their lives
for peace," said Rosalina Tuyuc of the National Council of
Widows of Guatemala (CONAVIGUA), on Notisiete.

The bodies will be buried in a cementery in Chichicastenango
and a plaque will be placed there in their memory.  Tuyuc
said that not all 27 victims were identified because of
threats and intimidation against relatives who were afraid
to come forward during the exhumation process.

47th Anniversary of the 1944 Revolution

Marches commemorating the October 20, 1944 Revolution were
held in the capital and five other cities, according to the
daily El Grafico.  Protesters called for an end to
government violence and repression and demanded higher wages
and an end to inflation.  Byron Morales, Secretary General
of United Popular and Labor Action (UASP) said government
economic policies favor transnational corporations and local
economic elite.  Morales denounced death threats against
student and labor leaders, while demonstrators left flowers
at the site where student Oliverio Castaneda was murdered in
1979.



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