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Interviews:
Friday, April 2, 2004: Veronica Puentes
Oficial de VerificaciOn de la Asesoria en Derechos Humanos, MINUGUA
Jefa de InvestigaciOn de la Oficina de Enlace de los departamentos de Zacapa, Chiquimula, El
Progreso e Izabal, ComisiOn para el Esclarecimiento HistOrico
Saturday, April 3, 2004: Carlos Leon Ramos,
Licenciado en ciencias de la comunicaciOn, Area de comunicaciones del Institute de Derechos
Humanos de la Universidad Centroamericana; San Salvador, El Salvador.
Monday, April 5, 2004: Marco Tulio
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Various conversations with Guatemalans Military, Indigenous Maya, and Civil Society actors
during March 2004 Trip to Guatemala: “The Challenges of Reconciliation in Guatemala”

The December 1996 “Law for National Reconciliation” ironically granted amnesty from
crimes committed during the conflict, except for crimes of genocide, forced disappearance, and
torture. It was critical, then, that the CEH proved that genocide had been committed in
Guatemala. It provided hope that those responsible could still be tried. Unfortunately, however,
88there have been no legal consequences for the genocide committed.
240
As a signatory of the
Genocide Convention of 1948, the State of Guatemala is required to prosecute cases of genocide
against responsible persons inside their state territory.
241
The Guatemalan judicial system
remains weak. At the time of the CEH publication, only one proceeding was pending.242 This
was the case of the horrifying 1982 massacre at Las Dos Erres, where nearly 300 people had
been killed, mostly women and children. The proceedings have never been completed; however
President Portillo offered $1.8 million dollars in compensation to the families in a ceremony of
apology in December of 2001. 243
Civil society has pushed public prosecutor’s office to take up several cases. On May
3rd
2000, forty-eight survivors of massacres in the Baja Verapaz and Quiche departments filed a
complaint against the former President Romeo Lucas Garcia, his brother Benedicto Lucas
Garcia, and Luis Rene Mendoza Palomo, the former Chief Commander of the Army and former
Minister of Defense. 244 Human rights organizations and families of the victims, rather than the
State, have pushed forward the trials of the 1990 extrajudicial execution of Myrna Mack and of
Bishop Juan Jose Gerardi in 1998. 245 The military officers accused of the crimes were convicted
but now are pending appeals. 246
Due to Guatemala’s weak justice system, legal proceedings outside of the country have
provided the most hope. The Spanish Audencia Nacional on March 27th, 2000 against former
head of State Rios Montt. (Nobel Prize Winner) When Rigoberta Menchil submitted the factual
evidence of the ineffectiveness of the Guatemalan judicial system, the Spanish judge felt
motivated to start an investigation.
The recommendations that address reform of the Guatemalan army constitute nearly twenty
percent247 of the eighty-four included in the CEH report, making it a pivotal issue for
89implementation progress. As mentioned above, the eradication of the presidential military staff  —
Estado Mayor Presidencial — was critical as it would get rid of one of the major sources of
human rights violations in Guatemala. President Portillo had begun the process of dismembering
this military body when a few months later he suddenly decided against it. He was, no doubt,
pressured to do so “as a hostage to the militarized past.” 248

The Foundation for Peace and Harmony was never created according to the recommended
procedure in the CEH. Instead, President Portillo bypassed the legislative approval process in
2001 to announce the establishment of the Commission for Peace and Harmony, as an executive
body. 234 Its purpose and responsibilities were supposedly the same as that of the proposed
Foundation for Peace and Harmony, except for an essential element. This “commission” was an
executive-created body, rather than legislative-created one, which meant that the Congress had
no power to check or monitor this new commission’s progress or efficacy. 235 With no budgetary
provision provided it and a weakened mandate compared to that originally proposed for the
recommendations follow-up body in the CEH, the Commission for Peace and Harmony has
functionally remained an empty commission that exists in name only. Former truth
commissioner, Alfredo Ballsels has dismissed the commission as “a meaningless appendix to the
already penniless Peace Secretariat.” 236 Nearly all human rights organizations have also rejected
this commission’s creation. Its existence perpetuates the government’s façade as one that cares
about the CEH and reconciliation. As long as this false commission remains nominally in place,
its mere existence will preclude a truly effective commission from being created for the
implementation of the CEH recommendations towards reconciliation.
During his presidency, Portillo did fulfill the symbolic recommendation for reconciliation
that specified creating a national holiday for remembrance of the victims. It is called the ‘Day of
Dignity for victims.’ 237 This measure for national reconciliation presents virtually no political
risk; it does not involve the president or politicians having to confess their own partial or
substantial fault for the fact that there are so many victims.
Portillo also sought and accepted pardon for the Guatemalan State regarding the conflict’s
human rights violations for which is was directly or indirectly responsible.
238
However, the
87manner in which this “apology” sought forgiveness from the victimized and immediately
assumed it, before they had a say in this process, demonstrates disingenuous motives. Thus, it is
clearly a political move, part of the “forgive and forget” approach that lets politicians write off
real, painful, complicated, but necessary truth-exposing, victim remembrance, and justice
initiatives.
To this day there has been no move whatsoever on the establishment of a reparations
program for the victims and victims’ families. During the last several years, a National Congress
led by former dictator Rios Montt has ensured that the legislature would not propose any such
financial fund or social program. The government claims that there is no money for a
reparations program, yet it lets the rich elite enjoy their extremely low income tax rate of seven
percent or less per year.
Luckily there seems to be some progress in the governments’ direct, complementary
involvement in the nation-wide campaign to exhume the remains of conflict victims from
clandestine graves. Guatemala has three principal NGOs that conduct exhumations and the
government has begun to develop its own forensic team to act in support of the NGOs’ work.
This step is a favorable sign, provided that the government-sponsored team remains independent
of party interests and focused on victims’ social, psychological, and legal needs. 239

During his campaign for the presidency, Alonso Portillo of the FRG (Rios Montt’s infamous
party) declared that he would make his best effort to carry out the recommendations of the
CEH,23° a surprising departure from the usual party line. Later, when he won in 1999, he
appointed Otilia Lux de Cotf, one of the CEH’s three commission members, to his cabinet. 231
During his inauguration speech he stated publicly that he supported the CEH report and affirmed
his commitment to carry out its recommendations. 232 Although his early rhetoric and apparent
willingness to work with ‘the other sides’ were important, auspicious gestures, Portillo paid
minimal attention to implementing the CEH recommendations during his actual full term.
Although others felt encouraged that Otilia Lux de Coil could serve as a watchdog from her
cabinet position to monitor the implementation of CEH recommendations, 233 she was not able to
put pressure on the President and administration as hoped.

There has been some progress in the purging of the corrupt rights abusers in the military and
public service who appeared on both the TC’s list of perpetrators and on the Ad Hoc’s list of
recommended individuals for dismissa1. 216 These officers appeared first on the list of the Ad
Hoc Commission and, thus, the Ad Hoc Commission, rather than the TC, is primarily credited
for applying pressure to the institution for their removal.
83While the Truth Commission was at work, the Ad Hoc Commission, charged with
conducting investigations deep inside the military, came out with its report and a sweeping call
to purge 103 officers from the institution. By the time the Truth Commission report was
released, several perpetrators it named already appeared on the Ad Hoc Commission’s list.
However, the Truth Commission report was crucial in increasing the pressure on President
Cristiani to confront the military regarding the remaining fifteen high command officers from the
Ad Hoc’s list and finally dismiss them. 217 President Cristiani informed the United Nations in
July of 1993 that every individual named in the Ad Hoc report would be removed by the end of
1993, including infamous figures like Generals Ponce, Zepeda, Rubio, and Vargas who had
already resigned or been dismissed. 218
Despite the initial encouraging removal of these generals from the military, many of the
perpetrators named in From Madness to Hope have retained high-level governmental
positions. 219 The legislature failed to follow the Truth Commission’s recommendation to draft
into law a ten-year ban from any public or political position for individuals found responsible in
its conclusions for egregious breaches of human rights.
220
Consequently, soon after losing their
military positions for participating in the murders of several civilian mayors, Joaquin Villalobos
became leader of the Partido Democrata and Ana Guadalupe Martinez secured her seat as Vice
President of the Legislative Assembly. 221 In the same way, former defense minister, General
Ponce, was appointed head of the AdministraciOn Nacional de Telecomunicaciones, and
Mauricio Gutierrez won nomination to the OAS Inter-American Judicial Committee.
222
The fact
that these gross offenders were handed replacement positions by a government that purported to
pursue reconciliation, directly undermined the meaning of reconciliation. The truth
commission’s intended punishment — removal from the military institution — was not allowed to
84be a manifestation of justice. Instead, it was merely a temporary inconvenience before the
government found new, equally lucrative and prominent, positions for them. For victims in wait
of reparations, social services, and basic recognition, this propping up of their perpetrators by a
government that claimed to be pro-reconciliation was another slap of injustice.
In addition to the troubling reappearance of old military faces wearing new hats of
responsibility, the removal of civilian officials from their positions has been slow-moving. In
fact, it was a more sluggish process than retiring corrupt officers from the military.
223
Mauricio
Gutierrez Castro, identified as having purposely obstructed justice in the El Mozote case,
remained President of the Supreme Court until July of 1994. 224
Impunity remains a severe obstruction to justice in El Salvador. There has not been one
conviction of an accused perpetrator. Cases for the murders of Monsignor Oscar Arnulfo
Romero y Galdamez5 , Ignacio Ellacuria, Armando Lopez Qunitana, Joaquin Lopez y Lopez,
Segundo Montes Mozo, Ignacio Martin Bar() and Juan Ram6n Moreno Pardo, and Elba Julia
Ramos and Celina Maricet Ramos have been left without resolution or punishment of
perpetrators. A coalition of NGOs together filed a case against high-ranking military and
civilian officers accused of ordering the infamous 1989 murder of the six Jesuit priests 6 with
their housekeeper and her daughter. 225 In 2001, the third Magistrate’s Court of San Salvador
dismissed all charges against them. 226 While impunity continues inside the country, a case in the
United States brought by three Salvadoran torture victims against two generals of the Salvadoran
military has brought flickers of hope to those in El Salvador.
227
The US court ruled in favor of
5 Violence against opponents by agents of the State, Death Squad Assassinations, Illustrative case #1. “Cases and
Patterns of Violence,” Death Squad Assassinations. From Madness to Hope: the 12-year war in El Salvador: Report
of the Commission on the Truth for El Salvador, 1993.
6 Violence against opponents by agents of the State, Illustrative case #1. “Cases and Patterns of Violence,” Death
Squad Assassinations. From Madness to Hope: the 12-year war in El Salvador: Report of the Commission on the
Truth for El Salvador, 1993.
85the Salvadoran victims and fined the defendants, all residents of the US, a punitive compensation
for the crimes and pain they had inflicted. 228
Unlike the active civil society of Guatemala, the lack of visible, vocal demand for justice
from the civil society sector in El Salvador has failed to put pressure on the government.
Salvadoran human rights groups severely lack technical resources and, therefore, the technical
capacity that helps organize and mobilize people, create a stronger network of NGOs, and
ultimately let demands be heard. 229

The report required the public apology to the victims for the crimes done to them, but there
has been no such move. Even two years after the Salvadoran Truth Commission report was
released, the new Defense Minister, General Humberto Corado, denied fault and reason for
concession to the victimized Salvadoran population: “The armed forces have nothing to
apologize for, since their conduct was consistent with the principles of a war in which a
clandestine enemy attacks regular military patrols. 9210 Margaret Popkin notes that “an official
acknowledgement of past wrongdoing by state agents is unlikely to come from the same
government responsible for many of those violations while it remains in power.
211
Though
three presidents and three elections have passed since the release of the TC report, the party in
82power has not changed since the beginning of the conflict in 1980. Each one of these presidents
was an ARENA party member, the party implicated in massive-scale abusive war policy.
Families have not been compensated through any reparations program. Salvadoran NGOs
have called for the government to provide medical assistance and to investigate disappearances
from the conflict but action has yet to be seen. 212
An important recent development honoring the memory and dignity of the victims of the
Salvadoran civil conflict is the recently constructed Monument to Memory and Truth in the
Parque Cuscatlan in the capital, San Salvador. 213 Inaugurated in 2003, it is an 85-meter wall of
black granite engraved with the names of more than 25,000 innocent girls, boys, women, and
men victims. The inscription reads: “A space for hope, where we can continue dreaming and
build a more just, human and equitable society.”
214
Unfortunately, the government did not take it
upon itself to build the national monument, as the TC recommendations had obliged it to do.
Instead, it was the Comite Pro Monumento de las V1ctimas Civlies de violaciones de Derechos
Humanos (Committee in favor of the Monument to the Civilian Victims of Human Rights
Violations), a conglomeration of twelve Salvadoran NGOs, that initiated the project and financed
the building of the monument. 215

EL SALVADOR: LIMITED PROGRESS
The TC recommendations were binding. However, binding obligation does not mean that
implementation has been smooth or complete. The UN was slow and not insistent enough to
81push for compliance with the TC recommendations as it gradually turned its attentions
elsewhere. Thus, the implementation of the recommendations has largely been left up to the
Parties and El Salvador’s very weak civil society. The FMLN had advocated for the truth
commission during the negotiations, but retreated somewhat, to the level of the government’s
compliance, once the Commission report was finalized and the recommendations were out on the
table. 208
Despite the fact that eleven years have passed since the TC report was presented to the
public, only a few of the recommendations have actually been implemented. The Salvadoran
government has been much more reluctant to implement punitive measures of administrative
sanctions or bans on individuals named in the report, and measures specifically for national
reconciliation, than to carry out structural and institutional reforms. 209

As in the case of El Salvador, Guatemalan society’s various reactions to the February 25,
1999 presentation of the CEH report would set the tone for the post-Commission process of
acknowledgment, healing, and justice-seeking. “The success of the CEH rests…uniquely on the
reception and impact of the report because it was the Guatemalan commission’s only product.” 196
The reactions would identify real or false commitment to reconciliation and acceptance of the
nation’s essential needs. Even more, the degree of congruence between public and government
reactions would determine Guatemalans’ own personal degree of hope for national
reconciliation.
The CEH report “far exceeded the expectations of civil society,” which was especially
excited about the Commission’s conclusion that genocide had occurred and its pointed
encouragement of trials with the urgent reform of the judiciary.
197
Unfortunately, reactions from
civilian government officials were mixed. The Arai government did not accept the CEH report.
During the official presentation of Memoria del silencio in Guatemala City’s
National Theater on 25 February 1999, victims, their relatives, and members of
popular and human rights organizations greeted each conclusion with clamorous
applause. Guatemala’s president, Alvaro Arza, his close advisors, and military
officers, however, appeared stunned. Arai did not personally receive the report,
instead delegating the government’s secretary of peace to the stage. Following
the presentation, he exited through a back door without comment. 198
Immediately following the presentation, Raquel Zelaya, the secretary of peace, remarked that the
commission’s work was commendable, yet reminded listeners that “those responsible for the
massacres will not be brought to justice.” 199 Roberto Robles, head of Guatemala’s official tourist
institute grumbled that such a negative portrayal of Guatemala would cause more “damage than
79reconciliation.” 200 The Minister of Defense, General Hector Barrios, responded to the report that
day by noting that the report was “a partial truth, since its version of history is nothing more than
the point of view of the commission.” 201 This slight of the commission’s credibility would
reappear later in a more pointed criticism of the CEH and “its truth.”
President Arzti s government finally responded publicly to the report on March 16th , 1999 in
a newspaper advertisement. 202 In this written address of the CEH report, President Arai, in
effect, excused the State of Guatemala for not having any responsibility to implement further
reforms. He denied even the need to acknowledge the victims and crimes against them in a
formal apology, explaining that on December 29th , 1998, the second anniversary of the signing of
the final Peace Agreement, he had already expressed some amount of regret. 203 This was clearly,
strategically timed before the release of the CEH report in order to “count” and so that any
apology following the report would not appear to be an endorsement of and submittal to the
report’s conclusions.
Arai, who had been garlanded the world over for the part he claimed in the
peace process, seriously set back the cause of reconciliation through his actions.
The clear rejection of the report, the creation of an ‘us and them’ reaction and
the simple churlishness of his behavior derailed serious comment on its findings
and set the tone for future discussion. 204
Four months after the publication of the CEH report, on June 30th, 1999, President Arzd declared
that that the report was wrong in proclaiming that genocide had occurred in Guatemala. 205
However, there’s no denying that massacres, disappearance, and forced displacement of
hundreds of thousands of indigenous Maya due to a systemized, targeting government and
military policy constituted genocide. The Arzii government’s negative responses amounted to a
rejection of the entire idea of the CEH report, leading to a most-significant re-polarization of the
country — this time not around the issue of the conflict, but around the issue of the truth of the
80past and reconciliation. Although it is disappointing to receive such a caustic reaction from the
State about the official truth commission’s work, a negative response was predictable.
Media coverage surrounding the release of the CEH report was active and intensive
nationally and internationally. Prominent opinion columnists in national newspapers such as
Prensa Libre and Siglo Veintiuno offered differing opinions that cut exactly along the lines of
political persuasion. Conservatives like Fernando Linares charged that the report was biased,
“an ideological instrument of the Left.” 206 A comment by Alfredo Klatsmitt demonstrated his
wary doubts that the report would be able to heal people and reconcile society: that it would
“open wounds in the memory of a people tormented by both sides.” 207 Disappointingly, the
report did not create a lively debate for very long. But the fact that interest in the report, shown
through coverage in the media, subsided relatively soon is not altogether surprising. The fear
that the military still perpetuated and the secrecy surrounding circles of political dissent or
government criticism demonstrate the personal risk involved in carrying on a public dialogue
(via the press) that upheld the incriminating CEH conclusions of, primarily, the military.
Only a few months after the presentation of the CEH report, the country elected Portillo, of
Efrain Rios Montt’s FRG party, into presidential office

The March 15, 1993 publication of the Truth Commission Report,  From Madness to Hope,
sparked major political controversy. Commissioners claim that the truth-finding/telling efforts
followed by the Commission report had a cathartic effect on the victimized population. Human
rights groups praised the exposing of names. The FMLN fully supported the report, while the
Supreme Court, the executive branch, and the Salvadoran armed forces denounced the report.’
86
The armed forces condemned the report as “unfair, incomplete, illegal, unethical, partial, and
disrespectful.” 187 On March 18 th , in Salvadoran President Cristiani’s public address in response
to the report, he called for erasing, eliminating, and forgetting everything of the past, rather than
upholding the truth established and emphasizing the importance of further efforts to seek
redress. 188 Eight days after the release of the TC report, General Ponce contended bitterly that it
intended to “defile the honor and dignity of the armed forces and convince the public that the
military had systematically violated human rights.’
,189
On March 26, the Supreme Court of El
Salvador criticized the Truth Commission’s recommendation to remove such corrupt, political
pressure-prone judges as “extreme and tendentious.” 19° Sadly, media coverage of the
presentation and content of the TC report was very limited at the national level due to strict press
censorship. 191 Internationally, the TC report attracted limited, short term coverage. 192
77Five full days after the presentation of the report, President Alfredo Cristiani called for a
blanket amnesty for all individuals charged with serious acts of violence. 193 His response was in
direct reaction to naming names of perpetrators — exposing military members, governmental
officials, guerrillas, and civilians and condemning the military and governmental institutions to
which the majority belonged. While the government had previously supported identifying the
military and civilian institutions’ “rotten apples,” it now reacted in extreme defiance. Although
the President emphasized the need to forgive, the victimized population and human rights groups
took this as an insulting gesture that played to the desires of the military instead of, firstly,
recognizing the victims and admitting to the wrongs done against them. “Political concerns
under the guise of ‘reconciliation’ … were given greater importance than the rights of the
victims and society’s need to address the past.
“194
The measure was rushed through the
Guatemalan legislature to be put into action, further undermining the victimized people’s trust,
polarizing the country, and the entire process of reconciliation, which the government claimed to
support. Such an across-the-board amnesty was a crippling rebuff that injured victims’ dignity
and their hope for justice.
In reflection of this turn-of-events, many wonder if the TC should have anticipated such a
reaction from the government, pressured by the military, and, thus, not tried to push anything
that could backfire. It is ironic that part of TC’s mission was to address the immense problem of
impunity in El Salvador, but yet its unintended effect was its implementation. Still, the amnesty
did not nullify the TC’s work or negatively affect the report itself. 195 Whether or not the names
of perpetrators had been included in the report, impunity would have won out at that time in El
Salvador. Even without the amnesty it is unlikely that a few, if any, individuals would have (1)
been brought to trial in Salvadoran courts, and (2) convicted there with an appropriate punishing
78sentence. The effect was to release a few individuals already convicted while morally
stigmatizing many more individuals that represented entire institutions.

The TC and CEH reports by themselves were an accomplishment. However, it was the
subsequent reaction of the country to the reports that was pivotal. The government’s and the
military’s reactions to the TC and the CEH would signal to the general population their genuine
intention to change the ways of old or maintain sinister “business as usual.” Subsequent
responses from the population or community organizations would reflect how and if the report
had reached the public, whether victims were encouraged by the report’s acknowledgment of
the truth, and the public’s overall confidence in the possibility for reconciliation.
76The immediate reactions of different sectors of society to a truth commission report foretells
what short-term potential there may be to reconcile different versions of the past within one
nation. Closure of the pain of the past, which virtually all people want, depends on whether or
not agreement on the past can be reached.