Guatemala Races to Preserve Conflict Archives

Guatemala faces a tight deadline to safeguard around 60,000 testimonies documented in files of victims from the internal armed conflict (1960-1996). These victims sought reparations for abuses they suffered. The government of progressive leader Bernardo Arévalo aims to protect these records by January 2028. The files were compiled over a decade by the National Reparations Program (PNR), established in 2003 after the signing of the Peace Accords in 1996. The accords ended the war and aimed to provide victims with project-based and financial reparations.

Under the administrations of former presidents Jimmy Morales (2016-2020) and Alejandro Giammattei (2020-2024), the program halted and was ordered to be dissolved, leaving the testimonies unsecured. Erick Briones, an archive assistant, described the current state of the archive as “damp boxes, piled up, incomplete, broken files.” He is part of a UNESCO-funded project to recover the PNR archive, which may one day be designated as documentary heritage of the world, accessible to those seeking to understand the country’s history during that period.

Among the archives is the file of Manuel Botom Uz, one of over 100 files detailing disappeared children. His family reported that in 1982, at the age of 4, he disappeared. The testimony reveals that the child and his four siblings were attacked in Quiché by military and civilian defense patrols tasked with control and surveillance for the army. Botom Uz’s siblings were handed over to family members, but he vanished. Two decades later, his body was found and identified in a clandestine grave. After exhumation, his family reburied him.

Elvin Díaz, Presidential Commissioner for Human Rights, stated that the Morales and Giammattei administrations aimed to erase collective memory and destroy a long-built heritage based on victim testimonies. He stressed the importance of recovering and preserving these memories as part of the nation’s living memory. Díaz explained that while the PNR’s primary goals were humanitarian aid and reparations, the archive holds valuable information for criminal investigations.

In blue plastic boxes, categorized by department, thousands of testimonies recount extrajudicial executions, murders, sexual abuse, forced disappearances, and the forced recruitment of men, women, and children during the conflict between the army and guerrilla groups. Memory reports indicate the conflict resulted in 200,000 deaths and around 45,000 disappearances.

The project plans to digitize the archive for universal access. A preliminary report from the United Nations Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances indicated that under Morales and Giammattei’s administrations, there was a systematic policy to dismantle institutions for peace and justice.

The files will form part of the Plan for the Reparation and Dignification of Victims of the armed conflict, announced last month by President Arévalo. This plan seeks to integrate and centralize dispersed information from public institutions and civil society organizations to continue victim reparations. Additionally, cases involving still-missing victims will be included in the Humanitarian Search Mechanism for missing persons during Guatemala’s internal armed conflict.