Article in today´s Prensa Libre: (5/30/05) Maintaining Hope, Baja Verapaz

Photograph – Forensics experts carry out excavations in Rabinal in search of the remains of people executed by the Military

Rabinal- Josefina Ortiz and Roberto Ortiz (aunt and nephew) expressed the fact that they are hopeful that they Hill find the remains of their relatives, who were murdered by the military on December 19, 1981.

The excavations are being carried out by a team of experts from the Foundation for Forensic Anthropology of Guatemala (FAFG) in the locality of Guachipilín, in Rabinal, where it is believed that Máximo Ortiz and Ovidio Ortiz, father and uncle of Roberto Ortiz, who is determined to locate his relatives in order to rebury them in an appropriate place and manner, were buried.

Ortiz explained that on that day, December 19, 1981, they were celebrating the town´s festivities, when an order arrived from the military commanders that everyone needed to be present at the locality of Guachipilín. ¨My father, my uncle, and other people hurried to the meeting, not knowing that it would be to kill them.¨ remembered Roberto Ortiz sadly.

They point to a captain Family members of those who have disappeared demanded justice against those responsible in the military. They only remember that the person who gave the order for the killings was Captain Solares.