Convictions in Dos Erres Massacre

News out of Guatemala tonight:

A Guatemalan court has sentenced three former special forces soldiers to 6,060 years in prison each for the 1982 massacre of more than 200 men, women and children.

The court also has sentenced a former army second lieutenant to 6,066 years in prison for the same massacre.[Carlos Carias got an extra six years for aggravated robbery.] 

Guatemalan law, however, says convicts can only be in prison for a maximum of 50 years.

Authorities say soldiers raped and killed women and girls, and banished hundreds of people from the community of Dos Erres.

The massacre was one of hundreds that occurred during Guatemala's 36-year civil war, which ended in 1996. Some 240,000 people, mostly Mayan Indians, vanished or died.

I'm not sure about a court case that only lasts a couple of days and results in 6,000 year prison sentences. While the evidence was probably pretty overwhelming, it still doesn't sound right. On the other hand, the Prosecutor's Office asked for over 12,000-year sentences for each and the actual sentence only works out to 30 years for each victim. And no amount of jail time is going to make up for the loss that the victims' families feel.

But as I said last Thursday, "And while it is right that these four men from the Dos Erres massacre have their day in court, I am uncomfortable with the fact that the people who trained, ordered, and rewarded them for their behavior will not."

Poll Numbers in Guatemala

Prensa Libre and Prodatos published new poll numbers yesterday. Prensa Libre characterized the poll results as having shown little change in the preference for presidential candidates. That's true, but the results do indicate that Torres has narrowed the gap between her and Perez Molina quite a bit. Well, at least Perez Molina's support has dropped a bit. 

Otto Perez Molina still leads all candidates having captured 37% support. Sandra Torres is second with 17%. Perez's support is down ~5% and Torres' is up ~2% leaving them separated by 20.4% (a reduction from from 27.4%) with one month to go (actually one more court decision to go).

~25% remain undecided and we don't exactly know what's going to happen with Torres and the Constitutional Court. Heather Berkman, an analyst at Eurasia Group in New York believes that “Although the polls heavily favor Perez Molina, Torres is probably more competitive than polls suggest...A positive decision from the constitutional court would likely prompt a surge in her numbers.” 

It's quite possible and probably likely that Torres would get some bump in support. However, I'm not sure how much it would matter. She still trails by over 20% and every poll has indicated that Perez Molina would win pretty easily in a second round. 

I'm more worried about the CC giving Torres' campaign a green light. I get the feeling that the societal response to a decision by the CC to allow her to run would be met much worse than a decision to uphold the RC, TSE, and CSJ rulings.

El Salvador Links

President Funes bans the carrying of weapons in twenty-seven of the country's most violent municipalities for sixty days. While Guatemala’s murder rate is slightly better compared to last year, El Salvador’s is slightly worse. Most of the increase appears to have been caused by a bloody Julu.

After two months of uncertainty, Decree 743 was repealed last week. I was definitely more of a Funes supporter than I was an FMLN supporter, but some of his actions these last two years really leave one scratching me scratching my head. He's got three more years in office so don't give up on him just yet.

Pro-Busqueda continues to search for 400 children missing from the Salvadoran civil war.

The United States has promised to cooperate in the ongoing investigation into the murders of the six Jesuits and their housekeeper and daughter in November 1989. Let's hope that the cooperation goes beyond looking for two suspects thought to be living in the US. Given the arrests of former Guatemalan kaibiles, I'm optimistic here. But the US should open up all its files on the massacre and provide former and current government employees to testify as necessary. The Council on Hemispheric Relations has a brief note up on El Salvador: The Truth Commission and the Jesuit Massacre.

Finally, a tense situation involving 30 hostages at an evangelical church in Guazapa ended peacefully yesterday. A father and son held the thirty people hostage for several hours before authorities convinced them to release the hostages. The motive isn’t entirely known but it is believed that they were motivated by injustices and the recent arrest of the father’s daughter.