Guatemala’s weak and corrupt law enforcement institutions have proved incapable of containing the powerful organized crime groups and criminal gangs that contribute to one of the highest violent crime rates in the Americas. Illegal armed groups are believed to be responsible for ongoing threats and targeted attacks against civil society actors and justice officials.
Although impunity remains the norm for human rights violations, there were significant advances for accountability in 2011, including convictions of four former officers for a notorious massacre in 1982 and the first arrest of a top-ranking official for human rights violations.
I see the situation in Guatemala as still very difficult but having come off its lows in 2008 and 2009. Arrests of high profile drug traffickers have increased. There have been some prosecutions and/or arrests of human rights violators from the civil war years. Murders of both men and women have declined two years in a row.
Guatemala has gone from a murder rate of 46 per 100,000 to 39 per 100,000 at at time when the rates of its neighbors are in the 70s (El Salvador) and 80s (Honduras). When CICIG first arrived in Guatemala, there were reports that 2% of all murders resulted in convictions. Today, it's between 5% (2010) and 9% (2011).
There's still too much violence and too much impunity, but statistically the country is heading in a better direction than its neighbors.
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