Guatemala Human Rights Commission/USA

 

Jennifer Harbury, Lawyer and Human Rights Activist, Speaks on her Struggle for Justice in Husband’s Case

Washington, D.C. -- May 6 th, 2010. The Guatemala Human Rights Commission/USA (GHRC) hosts Jennifer Harbury to discuss the precedent-setting case of her husband, Efraín (Everardo) Bámaca, a leader of the Guatemalan resistance during the internal armed conflict. Jennifer will speak in Washington, D.C. at Busboys & Poets (1025 K St, NW) at 6:30pm on the recent developments of the case in Guatemalan courts, and its importance in ending impunity for Guatemalan perpetrators of human rights abuses.

In 1992, Everardo Bámaca was secretly detained and severely tortured by Guatemalan senior intelligence officials on the CIA payroll for nearly three years. Since his disappearance, Ms. Harbury has been fighting for justice for her husband. His is one of ten emblematic cases now moving forward in Guatemalan courts, along with the Genocide Case and that of the massacre of Las Dos Erres.

“Everardo could have been saved,” she said. “And yet the U.S. State Department kept silent, knowing he was still alive and being tortured.” Ms. Harbury, a Harvard educated lawyer, author, and human rights activist, has been fighting for the case for the last 18 years. “Now we have an opportunity to hold his torturers accountable in Guatemalan courts.”

Harbury’s tenacity, persistence, and knowledge of international law has helped push the Bámaca case forward in Guatemala. Her efforts also resulted in the Guatemala Declassification Campaign in the U.S. and the disclosure of thousands of records on U.S. support and collaboration in Guatemalan government atrocities. Declassified documents revealed the startling official disclosure that Everardo’s torturers were paid CIA informants. The records are now being used as evidence in dozens of Guatemalan human rights cases.

In 2000, the case was successfully litigated against the Guatemalan government in the Inter-American Court on Human Rights (IACHR), producing a unanimous landmark decision and putting considerable pressure on the government to move the case forward. Finally, in 2009, the case was re-opened. The Bámaca case and Harbury’s struggle are cracking the walls of impunity for human rights violations perpetrated during the Guatemalan internal armed conflict.

Founded in 1982, GHRC is a nonprofit, nonpartisan, humanitarian organization that monitors, documents, and reports on the human rights situation in Guatemala, advocates for survivors of human rights abuses in Guatemala, and works toward positive, systemic change. Visit www.ghrc-usa.org for more information.

 

Contact: Kelsey Alford-Jones
Tel: 202-529-6599
Email: kajones@ghrc-usa.org

 

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