Armed conflict

Guatemala Jails Ex-Paramilitaries For 40 Years Over Wartime Rapes

JUN 1 2025·Updated JUN 2 2025

Story

Above: Simeón Enriquez (L) and Pedro Sánchez at the courtroom in Guatemala City on May 30, 2025. Image credit: Johan Ordóñez/Contributor/AFP via Getty Images

The Facts

A top Guatemala court sentenced three former members of the Civil Self-Defense Patrol, an army-aligned armed group, to 40 years in prison on Friday, following their conviction on crimes against humanity for raping six Maya Achi women from Rabinal, Baja Verapaz, in the first half of the 1980s.
Impunity Watch
Reuters
Pedro Sánchez, Simeón Enríquez, and Félix Tum were convicted of raping two women each, with the latter defendant also convicted for signaling four women to be raped by others, as six victims gave detailed accounts of events in their testimonies.
Al Jazeera
ap
This comes as 36 victims filed complaints between 2011 and 2015 against former soldiers, military commissioners, and paramilitaries for sexual violence against indigenous women during the country's decades-long civil war, pitting the army and police against leftist rebels until 1996.
ap
Impunity Watch
Barrons
In a first trial that took place in January 2022, five other former members of the Civil Self-Defense Patrol were convicted of raping Maya Achi women and sentenced to 30 years in prison. No soldiers have been tried in the Achi women's case.
Reuters
ap
Barrons
In 2016, two former military officers were sentenced to a combined 360 years in prison for holding 15 Q'eqchi Maya women as sex slaves at the Sepur Zarco military base — the first convictions in Guatemala of military officials for wartime rape.
Reuters
Al Jazeera
IHL
According to the UN-established Guatemalan Commission for Historical Clarification, there have been at least 1,465 cases of rape during the armed conflict in the country, with indigenous Maya women being the victims in 89% of the cases.
ap
Time

Sources Split

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The Spin

Narrative A

The systematic use of sexual violence was a deliberate military strategy designed to destroy Indigenous communities during Guatemala's civil war. The brutal acts were intended to create mistrust, tear apart families, and demolish the social fabric. These convictions represent a crucial step in acknowledging state-sponsored violence against Indigenous peoples and establishing accountability for historical injustices.

NACLA

Narrative B

It's a matter of fact that these women are victims who deserve justice for what happened to them, but there's no justice if those imprisoned are not the actual perpetrators. As the defendants maintain their complete innocence, it would be wise to wait for their appeals to be heard before drawing definitive conclusions about the men.