Memory of Silence The Guatemalan Truth Commission Report

This edited, one-volume version presents the first ever English translation of the report of The Guatemalan Commission for Historical Clarification (CEH), a truth commission that exposed the details of 'la violenca,' during which hundreds of massacres were committed in a scorched-earth campaign that displaced approximately one million people.

Preface; C.Tomuschat Introduction: Facing La Violencia: The Importance of the Guatemalan Truth Commission; D.Rothenberg Prologue PART I: HUMAN RIGHTS VIOLATIONS AND ACTS OF VIOLENCE Extrajudicial Executions and Disappearances...Forced Disappearance of the Members of the National Labor Confederation (CNT) in Guatemala City and on the 'Emaus Medio Monte' Ranch Torture...Torture in the Military Zone of Playa Grande, Ixcan, Department of Quiche Forced Displacement...Death by Forced Displacement, Chiche, Quiche Municipality Massacres...Massacre at las Dos Erres Rape and Sexual Violence...Maya K'iche Women Victims of Rape in the Department of Quiche Genocide...Massacre en la Finca San Francisco Nentón, Huehuetenango Acts of Violence...Kidnapping of Romeo Augusto de León, Baltasar Morales de la Cruz, and Héctor Menéndez de la Riva by the Rebel Armed Forces (FAR) PART II: KEY ACTORS IN THE CONFLICT AND THEIR STRATEGIES Strategies and Units of the Military and the State...PAC Members Forced to Kill Other PAC Members Strategies of the Guerilla Organizations...Arbitrary Execution of Six Members of the Guerilla Army of the Poor by Their Own Organization PART III: CONSEQUENCES AND EFFECTS OF THE VIOLENCE Terror, its Effects and the Institutional Weakening of the State...Forced Transfer of Children Who Survived the Massacre in Río Negro Municipality of Rabinal, Baja Verapaz Facing the Violence...Arbitrary Execution of Myrna Elizabeth Mack Chang PART IV: CONCLUSIONS: TRAGEDY OF THE ARMED CONFRONTATION PART V: RECOMMENDATIONS Tables Afterword 'No Room for Despair': The Impact of the CEH; D.Rothenberg Further Readings; M.Bellino Note on the Translation Acknowledgments Appendices

DANIEL ROTHENBERG currently a Senior Fellow at the Orville H. Schell, Jr. Center for International Human Rights at Yale Law School and a Fellow in the Agrarian Studies Program at Yale University, USA.