Montt's Violation In Guatemal An Analysis

In contemporary Guatemala, many of those who identify as Mayan or have Mayan ancestry remain touched by the chaotic and bloody rule of General José Efraín Ríos Montt in the early 1980’s. His regime is noted to be the most violent in Guatemala’s already tumultuous history. The recent history of Guatemala included a relatively short democratic break, followed by multiple coups, dictatorships, and military-run governments. The cumulating rising tensions of the Mayan people equally endured the threat of their organization against the minority ruling clas. This created a despotic systematic genocide of Mayan Indigenous people and innocent civilians. The government of Guatemala failed to address this problem until the 2013 arrest of Ríos Montt, a long-awaited victory for those grieving for the country’s bloody crimes. However, the decades long practicing of massacring civilians and lacking …show more content…
However, ten days after the verdict, the Constitutional Court annulled a portion of the decision, “based on an alleged violation… the violation involved RM’s dismissal of his entire defense team on the first day of the trial and brief expulsion of his defense counsel, leaving him unrepresented for a few hours.” (Neier). Ultimately, the trial set aside the testimony of witnesses who appeared during the hours he, Ríos Montt, remained underrepresented (Guatemala: Will Justice Be Done?). Many suspect the court was involved with lobbyists connected with CACIF, Guatemala’s leading business association that wanted the verdict to be overturned. The retrial was ordered for early 2015, but kept being postponed due to various issues concerning one of the three judges needing to recuse and the mental deterioration of Ríos Montt himself, now an 89-year-old man whose dementia has left him unable to understand the charges against him. There is no word currently whether a retrial will ever