NEWS ANALYSIS : Piece Still Missing in Guatemala Peace Mosaic : Central America: Three-year deadlock in lengthy civil war is broken. But the question of atrocities remains unresolved.
MEXICO CITY — Intense international pressure has helped force the two sides in Guatemala’s long civil war to break a three-year deadlock and agree on a human rights treaty and a timetable aimed at bringing peace by the end of the year.
The accords, participants in the negotiations say, take Guatemala a big step closer to ending the oldest, last war in Central America; they give a boost to the besieged administration of President Ramiro de Leon Carpio.
But when Guatemala’s government and its leftist guerrillas gathered amid fanfare Tuesday evening in Mexico City to sign the documents, a crucial element was missing:
To get the government to sign, the guerrillas agreed to put aside, momentarily, their demand for a commission to investigate atrocities committed in a war that claimed some 100,000 lives, many of them Mayan peasants killed by security forces.
The two sides agreed to discuss the commission later, but its exclusion from the new and widely praised agreements underscores the fact that a host of sensitive and divisive issues that go to the heart of the Guatemalan conflict have yet to be solved.
Still, the accords, signed as a high-level mission from the United Nations and diplomats from six countries looked on, come after nearly three years of talks in which the Guatemalans could agree on little. Had participants failed to reach agreement, the talks probably would have been doomed.
“This is a historic date for peace in Guatemala,†De Leon said in Guatemala City.
“This is a good accomplishment,†Miguel Angel Sandoval, a member of the guerrillas’ political committee, said Wednesday. “It does not fill all of our hopes, but it is a very positive step.â€
Besides the human rights accord, the two sides signed a timetable for monthly meetings to discuss issues ranging from land reform to indigenous rights. The timetable establishes December as the date for a final peace treaty and demobilization of the rebels who have fought Guatemalan governments for 33 years.
Some of these problems--like land--have plagued Guatemala for a century; some--like the resettlement of refugees--are extremely complicated. It is unclear how they will be resolved by the year’s end. “They are very complex (issues), but if the will to solve them exists, they will be solved,†Sandoval said.
Most significant in the accords signed Tuesday, the government for the first time will allow U.N. human rights monitors into Guatemala, a country with one of the worst human rights records in the hemisphere. The accords also ban paramilitary groups and clandestine jails; end forced army recruitment; guarantee the right of free movement and association, and provide protection for human rights workers.
The guerrillas’ earlier insistence on including the war crimes commission had been a major stumbling block until now. Their willingness to postpone it helped make the accords possible, but it angered human rights activists at home.
Spokesmen for the guerrillas, grouped in the Guatemalan National Revolutionary Union, say they are confident the commission will be established by May. But the government, and especially the army that backs it, vigorously oppose an investigation of war atrocities.
Guatemalan generals look with trepidation at neighboring El Salvador, where a Truth Commission established as part of peace accords that ended the Salvadoran civil war blamed most massacres and torture on the military. The Salvadoran army was purged and has lost much of its power.
Still, veteran observers weary of Guatemalan talks that go nowhere were counting their blessings with the progress that was achieved.
Besides the separation of the war crimes commission, the talks advanced in large part because of pressure from the United Nations, the United States and five other countries that are lobbying for peace as the “Friends of Guatemala.â€
The United Nations late last year appointed gifted mediator Jean Arnault to assume control of the talks. And in negotiating sessions in Mexico in January and again last week, powerful U.N. trouble-shooter Marrack Goulding, undersecretary general for political affairs, sat down with the two sides. Goulding was instrumental in the El Salvador settlement, often cited as a U.N. success story despite lingering trouble there.
American officials in Guatemala have also been taking a more activist role. They have impressed upon De Leon the importance of stopping the last war in the region as the best way to attract investment and heal Guatemala’s battered economy.
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