The Maya of Guatemala

Abstract

Guatemala contains 22 Mayan ethnic groups, each with their own distinct language. Conflicting surveys put the Mayans at between 47% and 65% of the total population. This report reveals the cultural destruction of the Mayan way of life, the massacre of thousands and the denial of land rights. Thousands of Mayans within Guatemala are today forced to live in villages, which some claim more closely resemble concentration camps. They are run by the army, and seem certain to wipe out the country's indigenous culture. Different language groups are mixed, Spanish speaking is enforced, Catholicism discouraged and access to hereditary lands denied. The Mayans face racial discrimination, poverty, illiteracy and abuse. The inhabitants of these villages are the survivors of large-scale elimination of the Mayans which took place in the early 1980s. Many human rights groups consider that 20,000 may be a conservative estimate of the death toll to date. This report calls for an end to the killings, disappearances, detentions, torture and forced relocation of the Maya peoples. It concludes by providing the addresses of those authorities to whom people cocerned with furthering these aims can present their views.

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