Guatemala rescues 60,000 conflict files

Manuel Botom Uz was just four years old when he and his siblings were attacked by the Guatemalan army in his Indigenous community in Quiche, in northwest Guatemala, in 1982 during the height of the country’s armed conflict.

His siblings were found and released to relatives, but he became one of more than 100 children who disappeared during the conflict from 1960 to 1996. More than 200,000 people were killed and some 45,000 disappeared during the conflict between the army and guerrilla groups. A UN truth commission concluded that the Guatemalan military was responsible for most abuses and that the Guatemalan state carried out acts of genocide against Indigenous people.

What little is known about Botom Uz comes from a government program known as the National Reparations Program, which collected testimonies of abuse.