The Guatemalan Forensic Anthropology Foundation ( es, Fundación de Antropología Forense de Guatemala, or FAFG) is an autonomous, non-profit, technical and scientific

non-governmental organisation A non-governmental organization (NGO) or non-governmental organisation (see spelling differences) is an organization that generally is formed independent from government. They are typically nonprofit entities, and many of them are active in ...

. Its aim is to strengthen the administration of justice and respect for

human rights Human rights are moral principles or normsJames Nickel, with assistance from Thomas Pogge, M.B.E. Smith, and Leif Wenar, 13 December 2013, Stanford Encyclopedia of PhilosophyHuman Rights Retrieved 14 August 2014 for certain standards of hu ...

by investigating, documenting, and raising awareness about past instances of

human rights violation Human rights are moral principles or normsJames Nickel, with assistance from Thomas Pogge, M.B.E. Smith, and Leif Wenar, 13 December 2013, Stanford Encyclopedia of PhilosophyHuman Rights Retrieved 14 August 2014 for certain standards of hum ...

s, particularly unresolved murders, that occurred during Guatemala's 30-year-long

Civil War A civil war or intrastate war is a war between organized groups within the same state (or country). The aim of one side may be to take control of the country or a region, to achieve independence for a region, or to change government policies ...

. Its main tool in pursuing this goal is the application of

forensic anthropology Forensic anthropology is the application of the anatomical science of anthropology and its various subfields, including forensic archaeology and forensic taphonomy, in a legal setting. A forensic anthropologist can assist in the identification ...

techniques in exhumations of clandestine

mass grave A mass grave is a grave containing multiple human corpses, which may or may not be identified prior to burial. The United Nations has defined a criminal mass grave as a burial site containing three or more victims of execution, although an exact ...

s. Its endeavours in this regard allow the relatives of the

disappeared An enforced disappearance (or forced disappearance) is the secret abduction or imprisonment of a person by a state or political organization, or by a third party with the authorization, support, or acquiescence of a state or political organi ...

to recuperate the remains of their missing family members and to proceed with burials in accordance with their beliefs, and enable criminal prosecutions to be brought against the perpetrators.

History

In 1990 and 1991, various groups of survivors began to report to the authorities the existence of clandestine graves in their communities, most of which contained the bodies of

Maya Maya may refer to: Civilizations * Maya peoples, of southern Mexico and northern Central America ** Maya civilization, the historical civilization of the Maya peoples ** Maya language, the languages of the Maya peoples * Maya (Ethiopia), a popul ...

''campesinos'' massacred during the " scorched earth" policy pursued by the government in the early 1980s. The forensic services of the Guatemalan judiciary began to investigate some of these cases, but they failed to pursue them to their conclusion. Consequently, in 1991, the survivors' groups contacted Dr. Clyde Snow, a renowned

U.S. The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territori ...

forensic anthropologist who had previously overseen exhumations in

Argentina Argentina (), officially the Argentine Republic ( es, link=no, República Argentina), is a country in the southern half of South America. Argentina covers an area of , making it the second-largest country in South America after Brazil, th ...

in the wake of that country's

Dirty War The Dirty War ( es, Guerra sucia) is the name used by the military junta or civic-military dictatorship of Argentina ( es, dictadura cívico-militar de Argentina, links=no) for the period of state terrorism in Argentina from 1974 to 1983 as ...

and had helped found the

Argentine Forensic Anthropology Team The Argentine Forensic Anthropology Team ( es, Equipo Argentino de Antropología Forense, EAAF) is an Argentine not-for-profit scientific non-governmental organisation. It was created in 1986 at the initiative of various human rights organisation ...

. Snow arrived in Guatemala, accompanied by forensic anthropologists from Argentina and Chile, and began the dual task of conducting the first exhumations and training the future members of the Guatemalan Forensic Anthropology Team ''(Equipo de Antropología Forense de Guatemala)''. The Team was supported in its early years by a donation from the American Association for the Advancement of Science of the United States, and its first director was Stefan Schmitt, who has since worked on exhumations in Rwanda and

Former Yugoslavia The Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, commonly referred to as SFR Yugoslavia or simply as Yugoslavia, was a country in Central and Southeast Europe. It emerged in 1945, following World War II, and lasted until 1992, with the breakup of Yu ...

. In July 1992 the EAFG carried out its first field project at San José Pachó Lemoa in

El Quiché EL, El or el may refer to: Religion * El (deity), a Semitic word for "God" People * EL (rapper) (born 1983), stage name of Elorm Adablah, a Ghanaian rapper and sound engineer * El DeBarge, music artist * El Franco Lee (1949–2016), American p ...

department. The Team was restyled as a "Foundation" in 1997. That same year, the

Historical Clarification Commission In 1994 Guatemala's Commission for Historical Clarification - La Comisión para el Esclarecimiento Histórico (CEH) - was created as a response to the thousands of atrocities and human rights violations committed during the decades long civil war th ...

(Guatemala's

truth and reconciliation commission A truth commission, also known as a truth and reconciliation commission or truth and justice commission, is an official body tasked with discovering and revealing past wrongdoing by a government (or, depending on the circumstances, non-state act ...

, set up as a part of the peace accords that ended the armed conflict) asked it to conduct four field investigations in order to secure physical evidence to back up the testimony it had heard from survivors; this evidence was included in the Commission's final report, '' Guatemala: Memory of Silence.'' By October 2004, the FAFG had investigated a total of 349 clandestine burial sites and had recovered 2,982 sets of human remains. The current director of the FAFG is Fredy Peccerelli.

References

{{reflist

External links

FAFG website
(Spanish)

(English)
Group Works to Identify Remains in Guatemala

National Public Radio National Public Radio (NPR, stylized in all lowercase) is an American privately and state funded nonprofit media organization headquartered in Washington, D.C., with its NPR West headquarters in Culver City, California. It differs from other ...

, 2007-01-29, accessed 2008-06-17 Science and technology in Guatemala Law enforcement in Guatemala Human rights organizations based in Guatemala Biological anthropology Human rights in Guatemala Mass graves

History

See also

References

External links