Paul Dosh

On March 13, 1982, Jesús Tecú Osorio and the other men of Río Negro, Guatemala, fled into the mountains. The military were coming to town and the men feared they would be murdered like their 74 neighbors that had "disappeared" the previous month. They left behind the women and children, hoping the soldiers would not harm them. Jesús and the others later returned to find 107 children and 70 women brutally tortured and murdered. The Guatemalan military and Civil Defense Patrols (PACs) had slain infants and pregnant mothers alike. The message was clear: the Chixoy Dam would be built, whatever the cost.

At the recent Center for Latin American Studies panel, "Testimonial and Legal Perspectives on Justice and Reparations in Guatemala," Maya-Achí human rights activist Jesús Tecú Osorio shared the tragic story of Río Negro. This story continues to unfold today not only in an accounting of the truth, but in concrete demands for justice and reparations from both the Guatemalan courts and from the funders of the Chixoy Dam: the World Bank and the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB). Tecú's account was complemented by discussion of Guatemala's Historical Clarification Commission by Mary Beth Kaufman (UC Berkeley-Law), and by analysis of the legal basis for reparations to involuntarily displaced communities by Barbara Rose Johnston (Center for Political Ecology). The panel was moderated by Prof. Beatriz Manz (UC Berkeley-Ethnic Studies & Geography).

Jesús Tecú Osorio (left) and Mary Beth Kaufman	Barbara Rose Johnston (left) and Beatriz Manz

Tecú's story began in 1975, when the World Bank and the IDB negotiated major loans to help the Guatemalan National Electric Institute (INDE) build the Chixoy Dam. Construction of the dam would require the "resettlement" (displacement) of five communities, including Río Negro, in Rabinal, Baja Verapaz. Tecú and the rest of his community were notified of their imminent "resettlement" in 1976, after construction plans were already underway.

INDE's announcement was met with resistance and their threats of force only increased the resistance from Río Negro. A negotiated agreement for the resettlement of 20 families in new houses in Pacux, Rabinal, calmed things briefly, but the government's subsequent failure to comply with the agreement renewed the tensions. Two outbursts of violence from security forces resulted in nine Maya-Achí deaths in 1980, but it was not until the formation of the Civil Defense Patrols (PACs) in late 1981 that the levels of violence in these communities rose to genocidal proportions.

Bolstered by direct assistance from the U.S.-backed Guatemalan Army, the PACs began a systematic campaign to obliterate the troublesome Río Negro community. Justifying their atrocities with a "guerrilla threat" that ranged from exaggerated to fabricated, the PACs would return again and again in their effort to murder every last inhabitant, down to the orphaned infant survivors. On February 13, 1982, 74 Río Negro residents were lured into an ambush in neighboring Xococ, where they were massacred and buried in a clandestine cemetery. Some of the now-orphaned children were sent to live in nearby Agua Fría. One month later, the PACs and the military entered Río Negro, but found no men, only 70 women and 125 children. Only 18 children survived-some as slaves of Civil Defense Patrol officers.

Although many Río Negro community members were still alive, it was now impossible to return home. Most remained in hiding in the mountains, but some sought refuge in Los Encuentros, a nearby archaeological site. On May 14, 1982, the military found them. Seventy-nine were murdered on the spot; Tecú describes their deaths as "slow and brutal." Fifteen women were also taken away alive in a helicopter. Their exact fate remains unknown. The relentless persecution continued on September 15, when the army came to Agua Fría where they found 35 Río Negro orphans. They were all killed, along with 57 other residents.

Although these massacres occurred in 1982, persecution of the Río Negro community-in-exile continued into the mid-1980s under the repressive rule of dictator Efrain Rios Montt. Furthermore, although Tecú emphasized the unbelievable numbers of people who were brutally tortured and murdered, he also drew attention to the many other victims, whose deaths by sickness and hunger he attributed to the genocidal campaign. These victims should also be accounted for.

Mary Beth Kaufman described how the accounting of the truth in Río Negro has been part of the broader work of the United Nations Commission for Historical Clarification. Unlike the open process of the South Africa truth commission, the Guatemala commission has been a closed process, resulting in the protection of the identities of both the victims and the perpetrators. Kaufman described the frustrations of the commission, stemming from limitations set by actors that fear a full accounting of the truth. The six-month time limit for investigation, for example, is seen as wholly inadequate to address over 200,000 cases of death from 1960 to 1996 (to say nothing of the thousands of incidents of rape and torture). Other limitations included a general weakness of authority, anonymity of the abusers, and prohibitions on reparations.

Despite these limitations, Kaufman described the final report as surprisingly forceful and more direct than the South Africa report. The commission found that the strength of the guerrillas had been a "non-threat to the state" and also found that the Guatemalan government knew this. The state deliberately magnified the threat to justify its intentional strategy of targeting civilians, including over 50,000 children. All told, the commission attributed 93 percent of violations to the army and the PACs.

The arrogant brutality of the PACs and the Guatemalan military has been an all too common story in recent decades, but in this case, the survivors of Río Negro are pressing for justice not only in an accounting of the truth, but also in demands for material reparations from the international lenders whose financial support facilitated the massacres. Barbara Rose Johnston described the growing attention to massive dam projects as a type of human rights violation that can result in uncompensated loss of land, lower standards of living, cultural alienation, and displacement (over 20 million have been displaced by dams worldwide).

Thus far, international actors like the World Bank have proved well-insulated to claims for compensation, but the Río Negro group has gotten farther than most in actually meeting with the Bank and the IDB. Kaufman emphasized the importance of such efforts in drawing attention to the harm done by dam projects. Even if the Río Negro group does not win reparations, they have forced the lenders to scrutinize their own projects and, at least internally, to deal with the disastrous effects of dam projects.

Another benefit is that survivors of massacres and genocide in Guatemala and beyond see Jesús Tecú Osorio and the Río Negro Community asserting their rights. They resisted when INDE told them they would have to relocate, and now, with at least 446 local community members buried or presumed dead, the brave survivors still refuse to be silenced. In the final analysis, it appears the Río Negro community does pose a threat to the Guatemalan state: the threat of a good example.