GUATEMALA: United Nations Concerned about Continuing Impunity

By Fabiana Frayssinet Reprint | | Print |

Fabiana Frayssinet

GUATEMALA CITY, Jun 27 1995 (IPS) - The United Nations Human Rights Verification Mission in Guatemala (MINUGUA) expressed its concern about continuing impunity upon signing a cooperation accord with the Norwegian government, designed to strengthen the judicial system, on Tuesday.

The assistant director of MINUGUA, Gerald Plantegenest, said numerous human rights violations continue to be committed even seven months after the Mission was established in Guatemala.

“It also disturbs MINUGUA that most of the abuses remain unresolved by the state, in terms of identifying and punishing those responsible,” he said.

“In this framework of impunity, special attention must be given to the shortcomings of the administration of justice and of the security forces, which are in charge of preventing and repressing crime. In some cases, a true rejection of justice is produced.”

Plantegenest spoke after signing a one million dollar accord with Norway’s deputy minister of development cooperation, Asbjorn Mathisen. The funds are to go towards a MINUGUA programme designed to strengthen Guatemala’s judicial system.

The Norwegian Agency for Development Cooperation provided a total of 10 million dollars in support of the Central American country’s peace process in 1994.

Mathisen said the one million dollar donation will go towards financing training for government prosecutors and defence lawyers in accordance with the new penal code.

It will also go towards promoting the Accord on the Identity and Rights of Indigenous Peoples, and to the training of indigenous human rights defenders.

The Norwegian official stressed that the strengthening of Guatemala’s judicial system is crucial to the democratisation and pacification of the country.

“Norway actively supports Guatemala’s peace process by political means and through development aid,” Mathisen pointed out.

The Scandinavian country is part of the Group of Friends of the Guatemalan peace process – along with Colombia, Mexico, Spain, the United States and Venezuela – which is helping to seek a negotiated end to 35 years of armed conflict.

It was in Oslo that the Basic Accord for the Search for Peace by Political Means was signed in 1990 by the governmental National Commission for Reconciliation and the leaders of the insurgent Guatemalan National Revolutionary Unity (URNG).

Also in Oslo, the government of President Ramiro de Leon Carpio and the URNG signed an accord for the resettling of the thousands of people who had been displaced by the violence, and for the creation of the Historical Clarification Commission to investigate human rights violations committed during the armed conflict.

Mathisen said his country sees MINUGUA as having “an important role to play in Guatemala’s democratisation process.”

The U.N. Mission was created in the framework of the peace negotiations in order to verify compliance with the Global Human Rights Accord signed by the government and the rebels in 1994.

Norway’s donation is the first to go to the U.N. Trust Fund for the Peace Process, to which U.N. Secretary-General Boutros Boutros- Ghali has called on member countries to donate 2.6 million dollars.