Article: Land Conflict (5)

Guatemala to seek justice if police killings proven

By Frank Jack Daniel

Champerico, Guatemala, Sept 3 (Reuters) - The Guatemalan government vowed on Friday to use the full force of the law if claims that police summarily executed at least three peasant squatters on a ranch this week are true.

The government-appointed human rights ombudsman told Congress that police may have shot dead three unarmed peasants in cold blood while evicting thousands of squatters from a ranch on Wednesday near the southern town of Champerico.

Journalists say they saw police execute unarmed squatters.

Frank La Rue, the presidential human rights secretary, said the government was awaiting the results of forensic tests.

"I am waiting for clear and verified information. If there were extrajudicial killings we will look for justice with the full force of the law," he told Reuters by telephone.

The three allegedly executed by police were among nine people who died when police and peasants, some armed with AK-47 assault rifles, clashed at the Nueva Linda cattle ranch.

"There is evidence that extrajudicial killings occurred during the eviction and the necessary documentation is being sent to the public prosecutors' office," Sergio Morales, the human rights ombudsman, told Congress on Thursday.

President Oscar Berger has tried to clean up Guatemala's poor human rights record since he came to power in January.

He has cut the size of the army and apologized for past rights abuses, including the infamous 1990 killing by the military of anthropologist Myrna Mack.

But security forces in rural areas are often a law unto themselves.

A Guatemalan press photographer said police shot an unarmed elderly man in the head during the ranch eviction, then threw his corpse in some bushes.

"They had beaten him and he was on his knees. They told me not to take photos, pulled out a pistol and shot him," said the photographer for a national paper, who asked not to be named.

The squatters occupied the ranch last year in protest at the kidnapping of ranch-hand Hector Rene Reyes, allegedly by the owners. They say his disappearance was never investigated.

Under instructions of prosecutors, workers excavated a suspected mass grave at the ranch on Thursday but found no sign of up to 20 other peasants alleged to have been summarily executed by police on Wednesday and dumped there.

After evicting the squatters, police set fire to their huts and possessions.

Posted by elcanche at September 3, 2004 09:52 PM