In a historic decision, a Guatemalan court convicted former military dictator José Efraín Ríos Montt on 10 May of genocide and crimes against humanity for the massacre, torture, rape and forced displacement of indigenous villagers during counter-insurgency campaigns in the early 1980s. The verdict is unprecedented: never before has a national court found a former head of state guilty of genocide. It sends a powerful message: no one is above the law and everyone - including...

The abrupt suspension of the genocide trial of former de facto head of Guatemala, Efraín Ríos Montt, raises serious concerns about victims’ access to justice, Human Rights Watch said today. On April 18, 2013, as the four-week trial was nearing its conclusion, Judge Carol Patricia Flores - who had been suspended from the case in 2011 and then reinstated by a judgment of the Constitutional Court - ruled that all actions taken in the case in her absence were null and void,...

Day 8 of the Rios Montt genocide trial had ended close to 8 pm with document review and challenges. Day 9 began at 8.30 am on Wednesday, with a plea from defense attorney Cesar Calderon for more “normal” court hours, particularly in light of the advanced ages of the defendants and various other commitments. Judge Barrios responded that the tribunal would take into account the petition, and assured that the late ending the previous day was exceptional. Eleven witnesses on the ninth...

The eighth day of the Rios Montt genocide trial began with a nearly full courtroom in anticipation of testimonies of indigenous women subjected to rape by the Guatemalan military between 1982 and 1983; their supporters attended in large numbers. Before the day’s proceedings began, supporters hung banners outside the courthouse and placed photos of women killed during the years of the armed conflict along an altar of dried flowers, with candles and the word “Justicia,” or...

Argentina and Iran signed an agreement to form an independent commission to investigate the 1994 bombing of the Buenos Aires Jewish community center. The pact was signed by the foreign ministers of the two countries on Sunday in Ethiopia on the sidelines of an African Union summit in Addis Ababa. The parliaments of both countries must ratify the agreement, which creates a Commission of Truth consisting of five independent judges, none from either Argentina or Iran. Suspects may be...

The growth of organized crime in Mexico and Central America has led to an increase in violence and insecurity, posing challenges to citizens, public security forces, and travelers. Migrants crossing the region are particularly vulnerable, facing increasing threats from Mexican drug traffickers, Central American gangs, and corrupt government officials. Migrants who choose to proceed even in the face of these risks increasingly are forced to seek the assistance of intermediaries known as...

A Mazahua Indian man was released from a prison in central Mexico after spending five years behind bars for crimes he never committed. Hugo Sanchez Ramirez was freed after the Mexican Supreme Court ruled his due process rights had been violated. "Hugo is young and indigenous. Those are the reasons he was attacked by the justice system," Quetzalcoatl Fontanot, spokesperson for the Miguel Agustin Pro Juarez Human Rights Center, told Efe on Tuesday. Sanchez Ramirez's ordeal began in...

The Communist leader also sought to buy weapons from arms dealers connected with Germany's extreme Right, showing the extent to which he was prepared to collaborate with his ideological enemies to prevent a US invasion on the Caribbean isle. Papers released this week by the Bundesnachrichtendienst (BND) - the German foreign intelligence agency - show information gathered by German operatives 50 years ago during the tense days of the Cuban missile crisis. They reveal that Castro personally...

The Chilean authorities should carry out a prompt, thorough, and impartial investigation into the alleged unlawful use of force by police against members of the Mapuche indigenous community, Human Rights Watch said today. Officers found responsible for any unlawful use of force should be held to account and the injured civilians ensured an effective remedy. In two incidents on July 23, 2012, Caribineros police shot rubber bullets at members of the Ignacio Queipul community of Temucuicui, in...

Online anti-Semitism in Spain doubled in volume last year, according to a Spanish Jewish community monitor. In a report on anti-Semitism in Spain in 2011, the Observatory on Anti-Semitism in Spain counted more than 1,000 anti-Semitic sites and web pages that the observatory says were created in Spain. In 2010 the observatory counted only 400 such sites. The observatory includes Spanish Facebook pages and groups in its reports. The document on 2011 is the observatory`s third annual monitor...