LAND AND PEOPLE

Population: 17,263,239 (2018 estimate)

• 41.5% Mestizo (mixed native and Spanish)
• 41% Indigenous
• 0.01% Other
• (Afro-descendants are rare in Guatemala)

INDIGENOUS GROUPS

• 9.1% K'iche
• 8.4% Kaqchikel
• 7.9% Mam
• 6.3% Q'eqchi
• 8.6% other Mayan
• 0.2% indigenous non-Mayan
• (2001 census)

GEOGRAPHY

• Bordering El Salvador, Mexico, Honduras, Belize
• 42,042 sq. mi
• Mostly mountains with narrow coastal plains and rolling limestone plateau

SOCIAL INDICES

• 32 environmental justice defenders killed between 2010 and 2015 (Global Witness)
• Femicide: On average, two women are murdered every day (United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women) 
• Life expectancy at birth: 71.8 years (2012-UNICEF)
• Male youth literacy rate, 15-24 years old, between 2008 and 2012: 89.3%
• Female youth literacy rate, 15-24 years old, between 2008 and 2012: 85.6%

POLITICAL STRUCTURE

• Constitutional Democratic Republic
• Leadership: Chief of State – President Jimmy Ernesto MORALES Cabrera (since 14 January 2016); President Otto Fernando PEREZ MOLINA resigned 2 September 2015
• Three Branches of Government:
• Executive: President appoints Council of Ministers to serve on cabinet; 4 year terms
• Legislative: Unicameral Congress of the Republic; 158 seats, 4 year terms
• Judicial: Supreme Court of Justice is the highest court 
• The country is divided into 22 Departments; each has a capital and is divided into municipalities

ECONOMY

• Exports
• Exports: sugar, coffee, petroleum, apparel, bananas, fruits and vegetables, cardamom, manufacturing products, precious stones and metals, electricity
• Export partners:
• US 36.1%
• El Salvador 11.8%
• Honduras 8.3%
• Nicaragua 4.8%
• Mexico 4.1% (2014)
• Imports
• Imports: fuels, machinery and transport equipment, construction materials, grain, fertilizers, electricity, mineral products, chemical products, plastic materials and products
• Import partners (2014):
• US 40.3%
• Mexico 10.7%
• China 9.8%
• El Salvador 4.6%
• Gross Domestic Product (GDP):
• $145.712 billion (2018 estimate)
• Agriculture: 13.4% of GDP
• Industry: 23.7% of GDP
• Services: 62.4% of GDP
• U.S. companies operating in Guatemala
• Chiquita, Inc. – banana industry with long history of U.S. connections to Guatemala
• Hewlett-Packard 
• Citibank
• ExxonMobil
• Procter & Gamble
• Among others

HISTORY

• Pre-Columbian Era 
• Pre-Classic Period: 2000 BCE – 250 CE, marked by cities that rivaled Egypt and China in size, power, and culture, with El Mirador as the largest
• Classic Period: 250 CE – 900 CE, height of Mayan civilizations
• Post-Classic Period: 900 CE – 1500 CE, decline of Mayan civilizations
• Colonization
• 1518: Spanish arrived in region, with expeditions led by Pedro de Alvarado
• 1523-24 - Indigenous Mayans are defeated by Pedro de Alvarado, a Spanish adventurer, and Guatemala becomes a Spanish colony
• Important to Spain for exports such as sugarcane, cocoa, and precious woods
• 1821 - Guatemala becomes independent from Spain but becomes a part of Mexico.
• 1823-1838 - Guatemala becomes part of the United Provinces of Central America (includes Costa Rica, El Salvador, Honduras and Nicaragua)
• 1839 - Guatemala is fully independent.

• Independence through 1960—
• 1839-1865: Rafael Carrera rules as dictator-he was influential in the fall of the United Provinces of Central America
• 1871: Liberal Revolution of Guatemala begins, led by Justo Rufino Barrios who modernized the country with manufacturing and crop production
• Led to coffee production
• 1885: Barrios attempts to reunite the Central American region; instead of unity, war breaks out
• 1931-1944: President Jorge Ubico is in power and is very involved with the U.S. United Fruit Company, especially in providing tax exemptions
• Following Ubico’s rule, Juan Jose Arevalo and Jacobo Arbenz serve as President and bring economic, education, labor, and agrarian land reforms to the people
• Land redistribution benefitted 100,000 rural families by 1952
• 40% of United Fruit Company’s land was expropriated by the Guatemalan government

U.S. INVOLVEMENT 

• 1800s:
• United Fruit Company-U.S. company that grew into Guatemala’s most important business at the expense of indigenous people
• 1900s: 
• United Fruit Company was the largest landowner in the country, preventing rural families from having access to land
• Lobbyists representing the United Fruit Company convinced the Eisenhower administration that Guatemala was planning to align with the Soviet Bloc 
• Because Guatemalan President Arbenz began land reforms to redistribute land, and 40% of United Fruit Company’s land was expropriated by the government, the U.S. government approved the PBFortune CIA operation that provided funding and weapons for Guatemalan paramilitary groups who opposed Arbenz
• The CIA backed a coup in 1954 to overthrow the democratically elected president, Jacobo Arbenz, because he was perceived as a “Communist threat” by United Fruit (now Chiquita) banana company
• Guatemalan exile Colonel Carlos Castillo Armas, who commanded the coup, named himself President and the U.S. praised him as a “hero against communism”
• The US backed the military during the civil war (1960-96), known for the “scorched earth” genocide campaigns, resulting in the deaths of 200,000 mostly Mayan people
• Civil War: 1960-1996
• Fueled by vast disparities between rich and poor
• Right-wing militias and government military forces fought left-wing “rebels,” mainly Mayan people fighting for social and economic justice
• Government forces served as death squads, committed acts of genocide, forced disappearances, and torture
• U.S. provided military aid, intelligence, and credit to right-wing forces in Guatemala
• Peace accords were signed in 1996 to end the 36-year civil war, though human rights violations still occur
• Over 200,000 lives were lost, with Mayans representing 83% of fully identified victims 
• Today:
• The US now conditions its aid on prohibition of using the Guatemalan military for domestic policing* 
• *The US looks the other way when the Guatemalan government sends the military to protect multinational business interests into rural communities, squashing the people’s protest infrastructure, mining and agro-industrial projects.
• Impunity for human rights violators following the war
• However, former President Efrain Rios Montt was tried and found guilty in the Supreme Court of Justice in Guatemala City and sentenced to 50 years in prison for genocide and 30 years for crimes against humanity
• The International Commission against Impunity in Guatemala (CICIG) is working to bring justice and rule of law 
• Immigration to the U.S.
• Large-scale immigration to U.S. begins in 1970s due to violence of the Civil War and grows into the 1980s as economic conditions worsen
• Immigration enforcement grew after 9/11 and the number of deportations of Guatemalans reached 30,313 in 2011

HUMAN RIGHTS TODAY

• Land rights—especially in regards to indigenous people
• Freedom of speech, particularly for human rights defenders, journalists, and community leaders
• Environmental justice
• Palm oil
• Reforestadora de Palma de Petén (REPSA)
• Rigoberto Lima Choc was murdered for denouncing the African palm oil company
• Mining
• San Rafael Las Flores Escobal silver mine project
• Hydroelectric Dams
• Hydro Santa Cruz project
• LGBTQ
• No legal status for LGBTQ rights, including no legal same-sex marriage
• High rates of violence against LGBTQ individuals
• Women
• High rates of femicide reported: over 6,500 cases between 2000 and 2011
• Human rights defenders are targeted and face forced disappearances, assassinations, death threats, assaults, and detention via the justice system (police/courts)
• IRTF is involved in supporting human rights defenders through the Rapid Response Network

MOVING FORWARD

• Call for urgent action to investigate the killings of peaceful activists, such as environmental leader Rigoberto Lima Choc, and other indigenous leaders who denounce corporate actions that violate human rights
• End the rule of impunity and bring justice to civil war human rights violators
• Promote access to land and natural resources to indigenous communities rather than transnational corporations involved in extractive industries
• Promote truth and historical preservation of memory in order to find reconciliation for past human rights violations