The army's plan was to get rid of the seeds. Even if it was a little one- or two-year-old child, they are all bad seeds, so they say. This was the army's plan. This is what I have seen. Case 4017, Las Majadas, Aguacatfin, Huehuetenango, 1982.

Children are present in most of the testimonies. Children, as a social group, have been deeply affected by violence and political repression whether as indirect victims of violence against family members, as witnesses to numerous traumatic events, or through their firsthand experiences of violence and death.

Children are less equipped to protect themselves when faced with a threatening reality. They resent more strongly the lack of family support, and their ability to make sense of what is happening depends on their individual developmental level. The security, trust, and care they require are drastically altered, even after the most intense violence is over. In this context, children can cope more effectively with traumatic experiences if they have adequate family support, can remain active (attend school, and so on), reestablish their daily routines, and if their families provide love, understanding, and age-appropriate information about what happened.

He was fourteen years old when he was wounded in this village. He hurt himself on tree trunks and thorns--he was out of his mind when he fled. And little by little he recovered. Later he got married and now he lives in Quiché, in the capital. Case 1351, Parraxtut, Quiché, 1982.

Children were killed and wounded in the course of indiscriminate attacks on the civilian population. Under the circumstances, they had more difficulty fleeing, were less aware of the risk, and had little grasp of the mechanics of violence. They were also more dependent on the family, which could not support them under the circumstances. Soldiers and civil patrollers killed many children directly, particularly between 1980 and 1983. They were an easy target in the course of strategic military operations against the civilian population. And because they tended to remain close to their mothers, violence against women is often associated with violence against children.

When we reached the Yaltoya path, the women and children were all thrown down on the ground. They were all killed by the bomb that they set off. But they were all women and children. There were males, but they were just children. Case 6065, Nentón, Huehuetenango, 1982.

Without asking a single question, the soldiers tied them up inside the house. They poured gasoline on the house and lit it. They all perished in the fire, including a child about two years old. My mother, sister, brother-in-law, and their three children were all massacred. Case 3164, San Crist6bal Verapaz, Alta Verapaz, 1982.

Half of the massacres recorded include the collective murder of children. In keeping with the indiscriminate violence of massacres, descriptions of children's deaths often contain atrocities (incineration, machete wounds, and drawing and quartering, and most frequently, severe head trauma). Many young girls were raped during massacres or while detained. Cases of children killed by indiscriminate fire or machine-gun strafing of communities are reported less frequently. This suggests direct, deliberate aggression consistent with the overall treatment suffered by communities in these situations.

A thirteen-year-old girl was handed over to me, the poor girl crying bitterly. "What's wrong with you, girl?" "Only God knows where they will take me!" the child said. I took out my handkerchief and gave it to her. "Clean yourself up instead." So a certain military instructor, Basilio Velásquez, comes over: "What's up, and what's with her? She should be 'vaccinated,' no? She's good." That vile individual raped her, and after raping her, sent her to the well. How was it that they executed those poor people? Look, they blindfolded her--and clubbed her on the head all the way to the well. Collective Testimony 27, Massacre at Dos Erres, Petén, 1982.

The woman lived in the house with her little ones. And they grabbed the woman; they stuck a knife in her neck. I was nearby, watching what the soldiers did there. They had the poor woman and she was bleeding because they had already stuck the knife in her throat. She was still able to escape, and they grabbed her and a soldier hit her in the face. They set the house on fire with all the little ones inside. Case 600, Chajul, Quiché, 1982.

During the massacres, the violence against pregnant women sometimes included extreme cruelty toward the children they carried in their wombs. Many infant victims of the horror never appeared in the statistics on violence because they never had a name: they were murdered before they were born.

They threw bombs, grenades...they approached through a ravine. That was when more children died. And they captured the pregnant women alive, they sliced them open and removed the baby. Key source 11, Chimaltenango, 1967-68.

In many massacres, however, violence against children was not only part of the violence against the community in general but also had a deliberate purpose. In the testimonies gathered by REMHI, soldiers or patrollers frequently refer to the killing of children as a way of eliminating the possibility of rebuilding the community and of circumventing the victims' efforts to attain justice.

Well, they told my sister--since among the soldiers there was one who spoke our language--and he told my sister that they had to finish off all the men and all the male children in order to eliminate the guerrillas. "And why?" she asked, "and why are you killing the children? .... Because those wretches are going to come some day and screw us over." That was their intention when they killed the little ones too. Case 1944 (ex-patroller), Chichi, Quiché, 1983.

Information on the deaths of children and survivors' accounts of atrocities also are consistent with testimonies about military training methods and the instruction that was given at that time to soldiers in order to implement the scorched-earth policy. During those years (1980-82), regarding the entire civilian population of many villages as members of guerrilla groups and physically eliminating them, including the children, was part of a carefully designed strategy.

When it was time to patrol, they told us, "Okay, guys, we're going to an area where there are only guerrillas. Everyone is a guerrilla there. Children there have killed soldiers, and supposedly pregnant women have just come and thrown a bomb and killed; they have killed soldiers. And so you all must distrust everyone. No one is a friend where we are going. So, they are all guerrillas and all of them must be killed." Key source 80 (former soldier and intelligence officer [G-2]), 1980.

Massive displacement of the population, which frequently resulted in family separation, posed even greater risks for children. The simple fact of not finding family members was tantamount to a death threat for the children, just as it was for many women. For the perpetrators, at that time, the mere suspicion that they could be the offspring of guerrillas was considered sufficient reason to kill these children.

When they got to the place, they (civil patrollers) asked the children if they knew anyone there [who could take care of them] and the children said yes, but Doha Candelaria already had her son-in-law, two brothers-in-law, and her uncle [with her, to take care o1']. And when the patrol asked the people "which of you know these children? If someone knows them, take them, and if you don't know them, we're going to leave them here dead," they said. Case 0717, Senococh, Ixcfin, Quiché, 1988.

Many children in rural communities witnessed the atrocities committed against their family members in the context of indiscriminate violence against the civilian population. Children were present during most of the collective massacres and witnessed acts of violence against their relatives. This may have been a deliberate part of the strategy of terror against the population, or it may have occurred as the children were trying to save themselves. Today, children who were eyewitnesses to this violence may be the group most afflicted with problems such as traumatic memories of the death of their family members.

I was playing there when I saw the soldiers coming up. As they came, my mom told me to run. Since my dad's house had two doors, one in front and the other leading out among the coffee bushes, I fled; I knew that they had already started killing. I ran alone among the coffee bushes, and my mother did not follow me. At about four o'clock in the afternoon, I went back to the village. They had already burned the house and my family. No one was left. Case 10066 (massacre), Aldea Kajchijlaj, Chajul, Quiché, 1982.

Threatening and torturing children was also a means of torturing their families. The torture of children was a means of forcing people to collaborate, inducing people to denounce others, and destroying community. It was a form of exemplary terror for their families and was an extreme demonstration of contempt for people's lives and dignity. Some people even stated that they preferred to die when confronted with the possibility of this kind of suffering.

I did beg God that, if they were going to kill me, that they kill me first. I didn't want to see what they were going to do to my children, because they always did it like that. First they killed the children. It was a way of torturing the people, the parents. And I thought about all of that, but thank God it didn't happen. And so someone was still able to escape. They took the baby out of the woman. She was alive and they took out the child she was expecting, in front of her husband and her children. And the woman died and her children died too. They killed the others; the only one who remained was the one who escaped. Case 2173, Buena Vista, Huehuetenango, 1981.

In addition to its power to terrorize, the army used violence against children as a way of eliciting accusations and information about guerrilla movements or sympathizers. Some witnesses described these atrocities against children as persistent traumatic memories of such things as mutilation of corpses and, in some cases, disembowelment. The ways in which children were killed epitomize the impact of terror, and they are remembered today with tremendous suffering.

I still dream; I still see it. Because my heart is still afflicted by the persecution. Because they have pointed their guns at us. Because the patrol has gone after us. And this means that I am still deeply distressed by everything we have suffered. What do they do to the children? They cut them into pieces. I mean, they cut them up with machetes; they cut them into pieces. Case 2052, Chamá, Cobán, Alta Verapaz, 1982.

They buried the ones that the army killed. They were decapitated with a tourniquet around the throat. They crumpled them up, they handled them like little balls. There were three-year-old children. We went to see. We saw them, three kids, they were hanging there without any heads. Their little dolls were behind them. Case 1367, Sacapulas, Quiché, 1981.

On September 5, 1985, they went after six people and, just then, a plane arrived circling. Later a group of soldiers arrived. They started shooting. My cousin R.J. died there, and I. and E., about thirteen years old (they are cousins). H.J.S. wasn't killed by the bullets; they pulled out his heart. Case 3083, Chitucán, Rabinal, Baja Verapaz, 1981.

The murder of children has had an enormous impact on the survivors. It is accompanied by an even deeper feeling of injustice and symbolizes utter destruction. Such violence against children is an assault on community identity, which encompasses the ancestors and descendants. It is even apparent in the language. For example, in the case of the Achí Mayan Indians, the word Mam refers equally to grandparents-ancestors and to their newborn grandchildren.

Because the truth is, so many innocent children died! They didn't even know why this happened. The truth is, when you went to places like that, you saw dead people all over. They left them all cut up, an arm here, a leg there; that's how it was. Case 3024, Aldea Panacal, Rabinal, Baja Verapaz, 1981.

I was twelve years old when they abducted my father. I was the eldest of the children. We didn't have the courage to say anything, we were crying when they took him. And after a while my father returned and said: "Look Mario, don't cry, I'll be right back." That was around ten or eleven at night. I was in the fourth grade then. I went to school the next day, and I told the teacher that they had abducted my father and that I wouldn't be going to school anymore because I didn't have anyone to buy my notebooks. That was how the family was destroyed.My stepmother went to look for work in Pajapita and I was left alone with my little brothers. Thanks to my aunt, who was called Lorenza--she fed us, and the neighbors did too. Shortly after my father was abducted, they burned our house down. That night we had gone to my aunt's house to eat and we passing the time playing ball. My brother ran ahead, and when he got to the house a group of men were waiting for us. They grabbed him by the neck and they said to him: "Are you Mario? No? We're going to wait for him." I was coming up behind. Then they sat him down and they began to pour gasoline on the house. Ismael thought that they were going to kill us both and so he thought: "It would be better if they only kill me, I'm going to run."  He got up and said to them: "I'm going to urinate." And they told him: "Don't move, urinate in front of us." And they grabbed him, but he resisted, and they fired two shots so he wouldn't go. But he didn't care if they killed him to save my life. And he did save it because I was coming up from below and when I heard the shots I said, "What's going on?" That was when I heard the crackle of the shot in the gorge and I sat down. And he was crying as he went. Well, they didn't hit him! He was smaller. Then I followed him because he was running, and that was when I said to him: "Hey, hey, what is it?" "Mario," he told me, "look, there are some men there who want to talk to you, but what they really want is to kill us." I started to shake because we were innocent, and we went back to our aunt's house. We were just arriving when we saw the flames shoot up, and I said to him, "Look, they burned down the house!" Our childhood was nothing but suffering. They left us nothing. Case 8585, Aldea Ixcahin, Nuevo Progreso, San Marcos, 1973.

We left under cover of the coffee bushes, myself and my six children. That night we headed for the river, feeling our way along it so they wouldn't hear the sound of my baby's crying. Afterward, when we were in the Suchiate River, my children cried from the cold. Oh, my little boys! When morning came, they had turned really blue with the cold. They had no clothes on, and I took off my blouse and wrapped it around my baby. We walked through the forest to get to Toquian Grande. Case 8632, Bullaj, Tajamulco, San Marcos, 1982.

The extreme hardship associated with persecution and flight into the hills or into exile caused rampant disease and death among children. They suffered deprivation and hunger, exposure, and traumatic stress.

Many testimonies about the first months of flight into the hills include descriptions of children who became bloated from hunger, a symptom of severe malnutrition. Many of these children died. Their families felt completely helpless and anguished by their inability to feed and care for their children. In some cases, these feelings persist to this day.

And that time, like I said, there was no nylon cover; and there was a huge storm so that even the newborn baby boy was close to death because of the rain. We had nothing to cover ourselves with because we were so poor. We had nothing. Case 1280, Palob, Quiché, 1980.

The women and children were already getting bloated. Our children were getting bloated because of the weather and the cold. When we left, the woman was also pregnant and her baby was born in the hills. And after its birth, the baby only cried, maybe because he had no milk and his mother wasn't eating well. Case 4521, Salinas Magdalena, Caserío La Montafia, Sacapulas, Quiché, 1980.

It was so sad because we couldn't find any more to eat. The children were screaming from hunger. Case 10681, San Cristóbal Verapaz, Alta Verapaz, 1983.

The children presented enormous difficulties for communities in emergency situations requiring rapid flight or other lifesaving measures. Many small children were lost, murdered, or perished because it was hard for them to flee and their families had difficulty taking them along. The tragedy of parents who had to abandon children in order to flee may exacerbate their feelings of guilt over the death or disappearance of their offspring.

When they were persecuted, there were a few among them who had three or five children. If they couldn't run or walk, they left them behind, because the parents didn't want to die. They couldn't take their children, because they left in the middle of gunfire. Case 10004, Chajul, Quiché, 1982.

There are babies lying under the trees. They died all over the place. There are babies hanging in the tree branches. It's like what they do with them when they're at home and they wrap them in a piece of cloth [the Mayans commonly hang pieces of cloth as makeshift hammocks for babies to sleep in--TRANS.]. They're hanging like that from the tree branches. And the babies are alive, but you can't take them. Where are you going to leave them if you don't know where their mother is? Collective Case 17, Santa Cruz, Verapaz, 1980.

These dramatic stories are repeated over and over again in different areas where people had to take refuge in mountainous areas or jungles. The presence of small children increased the risk that the communities would be discovered. For months, and sometimes for years--often subsisting in extremely precarious circumstances--the children could not even cry, play, or develop on their own. Families had to control their children strictly and even stifle their cries when the soldiers were nearby. This sometimes caused death or serious neurological damage due to asphyxiation.

And the children could not cry; we had to cover their mouths. We stuffed handkerchiefs in their mouths so they wouldn't cry. Case 3804, Cotzal, Quiché, 1976.

The child was crying and our companions scolded us. They said, "Man, please look after your child, he is going to give us away." And since he would get irritable, we would cover his mouth with a rag. And now something is wrong with him. Case 4521, Salinas Magdalena, Caserio La Montafia, Sacapulas, Quiché, 1980.

The militarization of communities throughout the armed conflict also had an impact on childhood. With diminishing frequency, this included the influence of the civil patrols, forced recruitment, and life in army bases or model villages. The mere presence of civil patrols as permanent armed entities in many communities had its effect on the children. From fear of aggression or death to the normalization of violence as a way of life, children were influenced by the warlike socialization patterns of life in a militarized environment. Especially in the early years, there are cases describing the participation of minors in the civil war as the norm in many communities. When it occurred, this participation forcibly militarized children and carried with it a high risk of death, as the patrols were used for search missions and to fight the guerrillas. Virtually throughout the armed conflict, the army was responsible for numerous instances of forcible recruitment of minors.

During that time, even the children were required to patrol. My son said: "Mom, I want to leave the patrol. I don't want to go out to patrol with those people because the guerrillas could kill me. Because the first time I went to patrol, I saw twelve dead bodies." (They later killed him.) Case 2988, Cant6n Vitzal, Nebaj, Quiché, 1983.

Although there are many testimonies about the rape of women, the consequences of those rapes are rarely discussed. The stigma attached to rape is probably compounded by the community sense of shame about such incidents. Many women have faced the dilemma of what to do with children conceived during rape. Given that mass rapes took place during certain periods, whether as part of the overall treatment of civilian populations considered subversive, during detentions and massacres, or because women were widowed and bereft of support, the problem of these children cannot be considered insignificant. When women kept the children, the explanations about their fathers forced them to confront the dilemma of their own lives and seek explanations that affirmed their own dignity and helped their children to better understand their situation.

Often I remained sleeping in the street, and because I was sleeping in the street I had my son. I don't know who the father is because two men came and raped me. And when I realized it I was fourteen. I turned fifteen just a month before my son was born. And that child, well there he is. He sometimes asks me- "And my father?" And I tell him, "There he is, my son." I try to tell him that a person who wanted to help me so much gave him a name; and I tell him that is his father. But he is not his father. Case 0425, Uspantfin, Quiché, 1983.

Some testimonies contain descriptions of what ultimately happened to these children. These descriptions are consistent with some research findings in the sense that the children conceived of rape tend to be rejected socially, as a form of community resistance. The women also tend to be shunned as the embodiment of the community's shame. One way or another, the children of rape who have been turned over to charitable groups or orphanages are a significant consequence of the violence against women and communities in many parts of the country.

Some of those responsible from Baja Verapaz raped the women, even though the women were carrying their children on their backs. They grabbed the children and threw them to the ground, and the men lined up to take their turn with the women. Some of those women became pregnant. The ones who became pregnant had their babies and went to give the children to the nuns. I went to register a child [to give him a name] in Guatemala City since the Sister asked me to do it. This child was abandoned by the mother because he was from the patrollers. He was fifteen days old when the mother left him. Case 5281, Buena Vista, Baja Verapaz, 1982.

Most of these children appear to have ended up in special homes that also took in children directly orphaned by the violence.

In most instances, family arrangements or different forms of intra-community adoption are examples of the cohesion and solidarity that provided orphaned children with the family and community support essential to their development, health, and socialization.

My son climbed a tree. There in the yard he said: "Mom has died, she has died. I am going to go to Dona Luz, since she wants me to go and live with her." Case 5281, Buena Vista, Baja Verapaz, 1982.

Families "gave" their children to others with more wherewithal to care for them, and with whom they believed the children would enjoy a brighter future, particularly when the mother was killed. When the mothers survived, however, this practice was much less common.

But being taken in by other families was not always an act of solidarity with the orphans. In the testimonies examined, there are abductions of children who were later used as servants by families who, far from being harmed by the violence, had used it to improve their social status. There have also been accusations of forced separation of families, in which children were subjected to reeducation in special homes.

In 1984, the mayor of Rabinal ordered the auxiliary mayors to take children between the ages of five and ten from the Pacux settlement to the Children's Home of the Church of the Nazarene in San Miguel Chicaj. They took twenty boys and girls against their parents' wishes. I was thirteen years old. Later, in 1988, the families complained to the parish priest that their children had been turned into evangelical Christians; they wanted their children returned to them. They were returned that same year. Rabinal Collective Testimony and Case 3213, Sa'chal Cooperative, Las Conchas, Cobán, Alta Verapaz, 1984.

There are also cases of children who were separated from their families or communities, abducted, and fraudulently adopted by the perpetrators of violence against their families. This practice has condemned these children to living, unknowingly, with their families' murderers. According to statements made by the then-defense minister, General Héctor Gramajo, this practice was common during certain periods, and may have affected many children.

The families of many army officers have grown with the adoption of victims of the violence since, at certain times, it was popular among army soldiers to take responsibility for little three or four year olds found wandering in the mountains. General Héctor Alejandro Gramajo, Prensa Libre, April 6, 1989.

Despite the violence they endured, extraordinarily harsh living conditions, and militarization, children who received sufficient family and social support may be relatively well-adjusted today. Many witnesses, even those who witnessed incidents during their childhood, have reestablished family and social ties, and are now functioning individuals. And, notwithstanding the image of childhood as a vulnerable period, some boys and girls have been active in stressful situations and have faced life's difficulties by helping each other and supporting their families.

And so all of the brothers and sisters pulled together and kept on living, even though they didn't have a father or mother anymore. Full of sorrow and with only a grandmother who also lived with them. The grandfather had already died. Case 5180, Jutiapa, 1987.

While adults sometimes responded to potential attacks by refusing to believe they were in danger, the children sometimes had the instinct to flee when they intuited that danger was near.s Many children were able to escape situations of extreme emergency, inform other communities about what was happening, and warn their families in time to save their lives.

For some children, this type of behavior surfaced later when they protested incidents that their families dared not mention. This may have placed them in danger on some occasions, especially in cases where they were living with perpetrators who remained in positions of authority.

The children told the police, "You people killed my father. .... I am going to report you," my kid said, since he doesn't forget things. Only my children were there when they arrived to ask questions. And one of my children said to them: "Yes, you were the ones who killed my father; it was you." And after that the police officers didn't say anything. Case 2987, Nebaj, Quiché, 1985.

Children need to understand what happened to them and to their families. When their search for meaning is met with lack of communication, silence, or contradictory explanations from adults, the impact of violence may be exacerbated. In contrast, clear explanations adapted to their needs, together with efforts to preserve the memory of their family members, can help them reconstruct their sense of identity.

Women gave half of the testimonies compiled by the REMHI project. In most of these testimonies they describe the experience of violence or the plight of family and community without referring directly to their experience as women. For this analysis, several specific interviews were conducted with key female sources. In addition, collective interviews were conducted in regions strongly affected by the violence, with the goal of fostering understanding of how violence had affected women's lives, social status, and roles.

WOMEN AS VICTIMS

The other girl, maybe about twenty-three years old, was between the kitchen and the bedroom. She also had three gashes here in the neck, and they had taken away her baby girl, who was still nursing. There she was, already dead, and still nursing her. Case 1871 (perpetrator), various locations, 1981.

Horror, death, torture, and abuses affected men and women, boys and girls, and the elderly. Although most of the victims found in the testimonies were men, specific forms of violence were used against women. Because they usually survived, women have had to cope in extremely precarious circumstances with the aftermath of violence.

"THEY TREATED US WORSE THAN ANIMALS"

Terror, in this extremely violent context, included ridiculing the victim. The dehumanization of the perpetrators led them to devalue the humanity of their victims.

They ordered us to eliminate those poor people, you know. You see, the soldiers looked for ways to entertain themselves, and so they made the prisoners they were going to kill, they made them .... There were women and men, and some soldiers, and I heard them laughing and I went to see what was going on. They made the male prisoners grab the women right there. I mean, have sex with them. And that's what they were laughing at, you know? At seeing those poor people, who not only hadn't eaten, hadn't slept, were feeling like shit, all beaten up--because it was no picnic to be there--and still, ironically, they made them do that. Key Source 027 (perpetrator), 1982.

USING THEIR MOTHERHOOD AGAINST THEM

One of the most powerful ways of pressuring women was to use their children to control, dominate, or crush the psyches of their mothers; the torture or death of family members and manipulation of emotions were tools used to torture women psychologically.

The children saw everything they did to their mothers, their sisters, and their other family members; and afterward they killed them too. Key Source 027 (perpetrator), 1982.

Reports of atrocities against pregnant women and the babies they carried in their wombs are particularly chilling. This recurrent pattern of behavior clearly demonstrated the army's brutality against the civilian population in its attempt to obliterate even the source of life.

The women who were pregnant. One of them was in her eighth month and they cut her belly, and they took out the little one, and they tossed it around like a ball. Then they cut off one breast, and they left it hanging in a tree. Case 6335, Barillas, Huehuetenango, 1981.

And the fetuses were left hanging by their umbilical cords. There is no doubt that the killing of children in front of their mothers was especially aimed at indigenous women. Interview 0165.

COOKING AND DANCING FOR THEIR ASSAILANTS

Women experienced atrocities and violations in the guise of daily routines; during massacres, with the prospect of certain death awaiting them, practices such as obliging women to serve food, cook, dance, and parade were a form of psychological torture. Taunting and humiliation turned such events into a gala occasion for the killers.

Then the army came and said to them: "Maybe we aren't going to kill you, but each of you bring a hen; there are twelve men and there are twelve of you women, so you will bring twelve of them for lunch." They went quickly and brought the hens from their houses. Then the massacre began: if the son was carrying out his patrol duty, and the father was not, then the son had to kill the father. If the son was the one who wasn't complying, then the father had to stain his hands by killing his son. After that, the clay pots with the twelve hens inside were put on the fire, and the women themselves began to cook. The army ordered them to make sure the food was well prepared after they had killed the twelve men. They killed them and tortured them, and they went to get gasoline. When they were all burned up, they applauded, and they started eating. Case 2811, Chinique, Quiché, 1982.

REMHI's testimonies also report some cases of massacres in which only women and children died.  The circumstances varied, but the men either were absent from the village at the time (Pexlá Grande, Yalambojoch, Chipal, Chinimaquin, among others), or they had already been killed (Pacoxom).

Pexla Grande, Pulay, Nebaj. Case 5508, February 1982.

Army soldiers reached Pexlá Grande.  They seized the people they found, killing some with firearms and burning others.  After killing these people, they put their corpses into a deep hole in the ground.  Between thirty-eight and eighty victims were reported, all of them women and children.

Yalambojoch, Nentón, Huehuetenango, Cases 766 and 6065, 1982.

This was the base of operations for the San Francisco massacre.  Upon returning from San Francisco, [the soldiers] made the women cook two cows for them.  Then they made a big hole in the earth, placed explosives in it, and burned the women up.  Upon hearing the loud noise, women, boys, and girls tried to flee.  The soldiers chased them, found them, and killed them.

Pacoxom, Río Negro, Rabinal. Cases 543 and 2026, 2982, Army and civil patrollers from Xoxoc, between 150 and 176 victims.

Those responsible reached Río Negro at six o'clock in the morning.  Almost all of the people who remained (after previous massacres) were women, children, and they elderly.  They made everyone come out of their houses.  They assembled them in the schoolhouse.  They made women cook for them.  They took them to Pacoxom, where they made them dance with the patrollers and soldiers.  Then they started to rape the women, beginning with the youngest ones, and then they began to kill their victims, beginning with the women. They killed children, but they spared the lives of some of them and adopted them.  Some women and children were able to escape.

ASSAULTS ON BODIES AND ON DIGNITY

Individual and collective sexual assaults are reported by witnesses as a specific form of violence against women that was employed in a variety of situations: during abductions and detentions, massacres, military operations, and so on. Rapes were not isolated incidents, but rather--in this war and many others--permeated all forms of violence against women.

On the interminable list of abuses, humiliations, and torture that women endured, sexual assault stands out as one of the cruelest and most frequent. Its complexity lies in its nature as a show of power by the perpetrator and an experience of abuse and humiliation for the victim. In many instances, women suffered additional consequences, including pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases.

Some soldiers there were sick; they had gonorrhea, syphilis. So he ordered them to go last, when we had all had a turn. The forced prostitution of women was a form of psychosexual control. Case 1871 (perpetrator), various locations, 1981-84.

In REMHI's testimonies, sexual assaults are attributed to army soldiers, patrollers, and paramilitary forces.

Six soldiers raped the wife of a friend of his, in front of her husband. It was very common for the army to rape women. The wife of another acquaintance, and her daughter, were raped by thirty soldiers. Case 7906, Chajul, Quiché, 1981.

MASS RAPES

Soldiers committed mass rapes during massacres or detentions of women. Rape was part of the war machinery and women were frequently sexually assaulted in front of their families.

One day I was able to escape and, while hidden, I saw a woman. They shot her and she fell. All the soldiers left their packs and dragged her like a dog to the riverbank. They raped and killed her. Also, a helicopter that was flying overhead landed, and they all did the same thing to her. Case 11724 (perpetrator), Xecojom, Nebaj, Quiché, 1980.

"Turn in your husband; if you don't, you will die right here." And they grabbed her and forced themselves on her; she was about to have a baby. She said she was thinking: "Who knows what these men are going to do with me." There were about twenty of them, and they did whatever they wanted with her. Case 1791, El Juleque, Santa Elena Petén, 1984.

The public display of sexual violence against women, often by several men at once, reinforced a spirit of machista complicity and extolled power and authority as "masculine" traits.

He raped the little one and then left her for the others to keep on raping her. I didn't like participating in that shit because, after you do it, you feel all weak, with no desire to do anything. But they didn't care, and afterward they killed them there among the dug-outs [buzones]. Key Source 027 (perpetrator), 1982.

THE SIGNIFICANCE OF RAPE

A Show of Power

Sexual assault is, above all, a terror tactic used by the perpetrators to demonstrate their power and dominance over female victims. Membership in military structures provided army soldiers and civil patrollers with the violent context and immunity from punishment they required to display their power over women.

The PA C and the army raped some children and women. They killed them with bullets, and hung them by the neck, and kicked them in the stomach. Case 8385, Saacté 1, Quiché, 1980.

Using the female body is a central feature of violence against women; it serves to underscore who must be dominant, and who must be subjugated. This type of violence was employed in numerous circumstances and occasions, reflecting social perceptions and behaviors that transcended the armed conflict.

The army would bring down to the zone big native girls with fat braids in their hair and earrings made of wool thread. They brought them because they said they were guerrillas. They would rape them and disappear them. Case 769, San Juan Ixcfin, Quiché, 1982.

A Show of Victory over Adversaries

Although women were considered direct military targets because of their potential support for guerrilla activities or structures (mail, information, food, and so forth), they were also used to demonstrate victory over adversaries: they often were valued for what they represented to the other side.

In many places, rape was considered a way to subdue and humiliate communities and families. Soldiers raped "enemy" women for the same reason that they burned down their homes: to signal contempt and victory (Dowdeswell 1987).

There was also a couple. They took her aside to a room adjoining where the husband and the rest of us were. The soldiers said, "Don't worry, we're going to take good care of your wife.' The poor man had to watch everything they did to her, torturing the poor woman, [until she] couldn't take anymore. The soldiers raped her one by one. After that they went to ask the husband for money to buy pills because she was in bad shape. Case 710, Santa Maria Tzejfi, Ixcfin, Quiché, 1982.

A Bartering Tool

Rape was also a bartering tool: some victims were raped and, in exchange, they or their children were able to survive, or at least avoid being labeled guerrillas by the rapist. In other cases, they lost their lives anyway. Sexual violence was often combined with counterinsurgency violence; that is, accusations that they were guerrillas was used to justify the rape of women.

"If you have a young daughter, we'll let you go," they said. They had me tied up with a cord around my neck. Case 6042, San Miguel Acatfin, Huehue-tenango, 1981.

War Plunder

The rape of women was also seen as a sort of prize or "perk" for the soldiers; it was a way of "compensating" them for fighting the war. In the context of violence used as a vehicle for acquiring power and property, female bodies were seen as just one more possession.

We found a woman, I called a soldier and I told him: "Take charge of the woman, she is a present from the second lieutenant." "Understood, Corporal," he answered, and he called the boys and said: "There's meat, guys." So they came and grabbed the girl. They took her little boy from her and they all raped her. It was a gang rape. Afterward, I told them to kill the woman first so she wouldn't feel so bad about the death of her son. Key Source 027 (perpetrator), 1982.

OTHER FORMS OF TORTURE ASSOCIATED WITH RAPE

Sexual assault was frequently used to torture women, but it was not the only way in which they were violated or assaulted. Extreme forms of sexual torture, including mutilation, were methods of killing women with the utmost contempt, cruelty, and terror.

There are women hanging. Well, the stick goes into her private parts and then the stick comes out of her mouth. They had her hanging there like a snake. Collective testimony, Huehuetenango.

The purpose of such atrocities was to degrade women through their sexuality, to show the highest contempt for their dignity as people, and to use the intimate aspects of womanhood to add a measure of exemplary terror for the benefit of the population.

Before murdering her, they nailed her to a cross they had made. They stuck huge nails into her hands and chest, then they put her inside the house to burn her up. They found her burned, still on the cross; her son was beside her, also burned--badly burned. Case 1319, Parraxtut, Sacapulas, Quiché.

A premeditated strategy of violence specifically targeting women cannot be inferred from the information compiled by the REMHI project. The testimonies do indicate, however, that the army's counterinsurgency tactics against women were consistent at different places and times and formed part of its strategy of mass destruction.

This counterinsurgency violence acquired certain genocidal characteristics. It attacked the community social fabric at its foundations by attempting to exterminate women and children in their capacity as vessels for the continuity of life and the transmission of culture.

I believe that there was an intentionality in the way women were treated, a policy to harm women and communities: mass rape, the introduction of stakes, the treatment of pregnant women--also when they were detained. All the violence. I feel that women bore the brunt of a lot of it, as mothers, as women, even because of their husbands' attitudes. The issue of disappearances had the strongest social impact. There were things designed just for women--for families--because women are the ones who preserve the family and care for others. Interview 0803.

It is clear that, while there may not have been an explicit counterinsurgency objective that targeted women, there was a deliberate intent to destroy the community social fabric, a fabric woven and sustained primarily by women. Women were also the ones to repair broken social ties, preserving family cohesion even under the most adverse conditions. They were the ones who preserved the essential ingredients for reestablishing life among groups of survivors.

I think that the counterinsurgency policy was very detailed, thought out, and calculated in the case of women. Because women definitely are a symbol, the symbol of life, of the perpetuation of life. In other words, to kill a woman is to kill life. Like in the case of the old people, the idea was to kill the people's wisdom, their historical memory, their roots. Interview 0165.