Dokument #1085183
IRB – Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada (Autor)
Information on this specific subject could
not be found among the sources currently available to the DIRB in
Ottawa.
For information on the penalities to which
army deserters were subject prior to 1994, please consult the
attached Response to Information Request GTM13644.E 15 April 1993,
which contains references to armed forces deserters.
Also attached please find several reports
published in 1993 providing information on the fate of individuals
who refused to serve in the Civil Defence Patrols (Patrullas de
Autodefensa Civil) (PAC). The PACs were set up in 1982 by the
military government as one component of the military's
counter-insurgency strategy (Amnesty International May 1993, 9).
According to the Country Reports 1993, even though service
in the PAC is voluntary, "army officers, military commissioners,
and PAC leaders often pressure[d] men in area of conflict to become
PAC members," and those who refused to serve "were killed or
suffered other abuses" (1994, 452).
This response was prepared after
researching publicly accessible information currently available to
the DIRB within time constraints. This response is not, and does
not purport to be, conclusive as to the merit of any particular
claim to refugee status or asylum. Please find attached the list of
sources consulted in researching this Information Request.
Amnesty International. May 1993.
Guatemala: Impunity -A Question of Political Will (AI Index:
AMR 34/17/93). London: Amnesty International Publications.
Country Reports on Human Rights
Practices for 1993. 1994. United States Department of State.
Washington, DC: United States Government Printing Office.
Amnesty International. May 1993.
Guatemala: Impunity A Question of Political Will (AI Index:
AMR 34/17/93). London: Amnesty International Publications. p.
9.
. March 1993. Guatemala: Written
Statement by Amnesty International to the United Nations Commission
on Human Rights (AI Index: AMR 34/08/93). London: Amnesty
International Publications, pp. 1-2.
Country Reports on Human Rights
Practices for 1993. 1994. United States Department of State.
Washington, DC: United States Government Printing Office, p.
452.
Documentation, Information and Research
Branch (DIRB), Immigration and Refugee Board, Ottawa. 15 April
1993. Response to Information Request GTM13644.
Guatemala Human Rights Update
[Washington, DC]. 22 December 1993. No. 25. "Campesinos Opposed to
PACs Threatened," p. 3.
. 17 September 1993. Vol. 18. "Bous who
did Not Patrol disappear," p. 4.
. 23 July 1993. Vol. 14. "PAc Members to
Be Tried for Spirano's Death," p. 2.
. 27 May 1993. Vol. 10. "Men Renouncing
PACs and Family of Murdered CERJ Member Threatened," p. 6.
US Committee for Refugees (USCR).
February 1993. El Retorno: Guatemalans' Risky Repatriation
Begins. Washington, DC: USCR, p. 14.
Critique: Review of the Department of
State's Country Reports on Human Rights Practices. Yearly.
Human Rights Watch. Human Rights
Watch World Report. Yearly.
Documentation-Réfugiés [Paris]. Weekly.
News From Americas Watch [New
York]. Monthly.
Latin America Update
[Washington]. Monthly.
Latin America Press [Lima].
Weekly.
Latin American Newsletters
[London]. Monthly.
NACLA Report on the Americas.
Monthly.
Problèmes d'Amérique
latine. Quarterly.
On-line search and oral sources.