NY Times Article

Drug Gangs Use Violence to Sway Guatemala Vote

By Marc Lacey
Published: N.Y. Times, August 4, 2007

Guatemala City — It is election time in Guatemala and that means rallies and banners — and body bags.

In the campaigning leading up to elections on Sept. 9, the authorities have reported 61 violent attacks on candidates and political activists. The death toll is 26, including seven national congressmen and numerous other office seekers.

The flurry of bullets, and the occasional machete attack, make this the bloodiest campaign season in the history of a country with a long tradition of political violence, including 36 years of civil war that ended in 1996. But what makes the bloodletting different this time is that it has been attributed to narcotics traffickers and their allies intent on infiltrating Guatemala’s political system.

So dangerous is campaigning that Álvaro Colom, the leading presidential candidate, flies in a helicopter to avoid being ambushed and travels with a physician with extensive experience in bullet wounds. He is careful what he eats, lest someone poison it. “I hate to say this, but it’s more violent now than during the war,” he said.

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