Guatemala court convicts 3 ex-paramilitaries of war crimes for rape and gives them 40-year sentences

More than four decades after Guatemalan soldiers and paramilitaries raped Indigenous women amid their efforts to crush an insurgency during the country’s 36-year civil war, a court has convicted three men of crimes against humanity for their actions and sentenced them to 40 years in prison

More than four decades after Guatemalan soldiers and paramilitaries raped Indigenous women during their efforts to crush an insurgency in the country’s 36-year civil war, a court on Friday convicted three men of crimes against humanity for their actions and sentenced them to 40 years in prison.

Thirty-six women from the Maya Achi Indigenous group came forward in 2011 to seek justice for the abuses they suffered between 1981 and 1985. They came from Rabinal, a small town about 55 miles (88 kms) north of the capital.

Six of them testified against the three men convicted Friday.

Judge María Eugenia Castellanos, president of the panel, said the women had been brave to come on repeated occasions to testify. “They are crimes of solitude that stigmatize the woman. It is not easy to speak of them,” she said.

Judge Marling Mayela González Arrivillaga said there was no doubt about the women’s testimony.

In 2022, five other paramilitaries – men from the area trained by soldiers to help root out insurgents – were convicted of raping women and sentenced to 30 years in prison. No soldiers have been tried for the acts.

Guatemala's civil war pitted the army and police against leftist rebels. It ended with the signing of peace accords in 1996.