Two former Guatemalan soldiers are on trial this week for war crimes during the country's 36-year civil war, including the forced disappearance and murder of indigenous men and the sexual enslavement of Mayan women during a 10-month period in 1982-83.
This historic trial will mark the first time that sexual slavery will be prosecuted as a war crime in the country where it is alleged to have occurred, according to the BBC.
The defendants are Esteelmer Reyes Girón, a 59-year-old retired colonel, and 74-year-old former soldier Heriberto Valdez Asij. They are officially accused of "authorizing and consenting for soldiers under his command to exercise sexual violence and inhuman, cruel and degrading treatment against Maya-Q'eqchi' women" in the northeastern village of Sepur Zarco, where the military was deployed at the time, reports the Associated Press.
Bringing the case to trial has involved a lengthy process. The victims are now in their 70s and 80s, and they cannot speak Spanish - only their Mayan language of Q'eqchi' - according to the Guardian. With support from women's advocacy groups, the women, along with five male witnesses who were held and tortured at the Sepur Zarco military base, first came forward to tell their stories in 2011.
According to the testimonies, 15 Mayan leaders in Sepur Zarco were seized and killed or forcibly disappeared, and within a few weeks the soldiers returned to destroy the village and to force the women and children to relocate to huts close to the military base. Routinely, each woman had to undertake a 12-hour "shift" at the base where they were systematically raped as well as forced to perform domestic tasks, as explained by the Guardian.
Both of the defendants were arrested in June 2014, and the case initially went to trial in October, the BBC reports. It was delayed, however, because of challenges made by the accused. Due to the age and infirmity of the victims, in 2012 the court allowed for pre-trial evidentiary hearings to occur to ensure that the victims' and witnesses' testimonies would be on record.
These crimes occurred under ex-dictator Efrain Rios Montt, who is currently facing retrial on charges of genocide and crimes against humanity, including the slaughter of 1,771 Maya Ixil indigenous people in Guatemala's Quiche region in 1982-83, Reuters reports.
In total, Guatemala's civil war (1960-1996) left more than 200,000 dead, according to a United Nations' 1999 Truth and Reconciliation report, with the Mayan population representing 83 percent of the victims.
The trial is expected to last 40 days, reports the Latin Dispatch. The defendants deny the accusations.
