Women Human Rights Defenders International Coalition stands in solidarity with all those courageously fighting impunity in Guatemalan

genocide trial of Rios Montt and Jos Mauricio Rodrguez Snchez The WHRD IC stands in solidarity with the Women Human Rights Defenders (WHRDs), survivors, witnesses, and all those who have bravely worked towards justice in the trial of Guatemalas former dictator and chief of military intelligence for genocide. In the face of a series of threats, intimidation, surveillance, and raids, as well as alarming efforts by the defense lawyers and powerful allies of the defendants to disrupt the trial, the WHRD IC expresses its profound concern for the well-being of all those fighting impunity and condemns all attempts to stymie justice. The WHRD IC calls on the Guatemalan authorities to take all possible actions to ensure a fair, independent and impartial judicial process' in this case. The trial has seen numerous delays, with defense lawyers filing over one hundred appeals. 1 On Thursday, 18 March, Judge Patricia Flores issued a ruling to suspend the trial. The decision would nullify all actions taken in the trial since November 2011, dismissing the testimony of the more than one hundred courageous witnesses who have come forward.2 While the Attorney General has since declared the ruling illegal and the judge overseeing the trial has permitted the trial to continue today, the defense lawyers continue to interfere with court proceedings, staging a walk-out of the courtroom on Friday, 23 April.3 Under Guatemalan law, the decision to annul the trial will stand unless it can be reversed within ten days.4 The WHRD IC urges the Guatemalan state to uphold the rule of law and their responsibility to guarantee a fair and independent trial. The trial marks the first case of a former head of State being put on trial for genocide by a national tribunal and has profound implications for womens human rights and gender justice. The gendered dimension of the genocidal violence targeting the Mayan indigenous populations is well documented. It is estimated that 600 massacres occurred and, approximately one out of every four victims of human

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http://www.fidh.org/Case-against-Rios-Montt-an-13041 Judge Flores was removed from the case by the Supreme Court in November 2011 due to allegations of bias, and was then reinstated a few months later. Rios Montts lawyers have argued that Flores should have been handling the case from the start, resulting in Guatemalas constitutional court ordering that the case be rolled back to when she was removed and that all actions taken since November 2011 are void in the case. http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/19/world/americas/judge-in-guatemala-annuls-genocide-trial.html
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Source: http://www.riosmontt-trial.org/2013/04/day-20-defense-attorneys-walk-out-of-trial-in-protestpreliminary-court-judge-annuls-sentence-as-attorney-general-calls-action-illegal-and-promises-legal-challenge/ 4 http://www.amnesty.org.uk/news_details.asp?NewsID=20738

rights violations and violent incidents were women.5 Further thousands of women were raped in as strategy of war. As recently testified by Paloma Soria, expert on gender and international law: the attack on women was generalized and systematic and was used to exterminate the Mayan community. The use of sexual violence was used to sow terror and break the social and cultural fabric and therefore constituted genocide.6 Bringing the perpetrators to justice is an essential step in achieving peace with dignity, respecting the memory of the women who were tortured and murdered and upholding the rights of the women who survived. The WHRD IC notes that WHRDs, as women defending rights, are of critical importance to the pursuit of truth, justice, and dignity in Guatemala. In addition to speaking out to defend womens human rights and gender justice, and ensuring that these heinous crimes perpetrated against women are not buried, WHRDs and their organizations are also important allies to women survivors of sexual violence, who, as a result of patriarchal beliefs and practices, are vulnerable to being stigmatized by their communities. In spite of their critical importance, WHRDs and their organizations in Guatemala are at a particularly high risk of being targeted by violence because of their gender and the work that they do. 7 WHRDs and their organizations who are working to achieve justice in the current genocide trial have reported multiple attacks and rights violations. As noted by the UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights Defenders, WHRDs in Americas face greatest risk of being killed or being the target of an attempted assassination, with women indigenous rights activists in Guatemala particularly vulnerable.8 Alarmingly, a recent report states that 685 women were assassinated in Guatemala in 2010, compared to 213 in 2000, with more than 95% of crimes going unpunished. The report found that the Guatemalan government was directly responsible for its failure to protect women and WHRDs due to an underlying lack of political will at all levels of government.9 Given the current context of skyrocketing violence and rights violations against WHRDs and femicide rates as well as rampant impunity in Guatemala, it could not be more urgent for the Guatemalan state to act swiftly and decisively to protect WHRDs in an effective and gender sensitive manner. The WHRD IC echoes the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay in calling on the authorities to take all necessary measures to ensure that judges, prosecutors, lawyers and others involved may carry out their functions without fear for their life, integrity and security, or those of their families. The protection

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http://www.awid.org/News-Analysis/Friday-Files/Guatemala-Genocide-Trial-Women-Seeking-the-Truth http://www.riosmontt-trial.org/2013/04/prosecution-experts-testify-on-psychological-cultural-statistical-andgender-issues/ 7 For more information on the situation of WHRDs see the Global Report: http://www.defendingwomendefendingrights.org/pdf/WHRD_IC_Global%20Report_2012.pdf. For information specific to Guatemala see cases 2.4; 1.22; 1.11; 1.10. 8 http://www2.ohchr.org/english/bodies/hrcouncil/docs/16session/A-HRC-16-44.pdf 9 From survivors to defenders: Women Confronting violence in Mexico, Honduras, and Guatemala. p 6. http://issuu.com/greencomdesign/docs/nwi-delegation_report_centralam?mode=window

of all those involved in this crucial case is essential, if the rule of law is to be seen to be respected, and truth and justice are to prevail in Guatemala. 10

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http://www.fidh.org/Case-against-Rios-Montt-an-13041