26
a.
Testimony of Santiago Cabrera López, former URNG combatant
He was connected with the guerrilla group known as ORPA, part of URNG, since May
22, 1989. Among other reasons, he joined this group due to “the absence of justice
in [his] country, the lack of education [and] health.”
He was a combatant in the Luis Ixmatá military front, which was headed by Bámaca
Velásquez, who was known as Comandante Everardo. He operated in the area of the
Department of San Marcos during one year and ten months, until he was detained on
March 8, 1991.
He met Jennifer Harbury in 1990 in the guerrilla camp.
One year after he had been captured by the Army, when he had won its confidence,
he received payment for services provided to Army “military intelligence”, G-2. He
did not take advantage of the National Reconciliation Law.
He was captured by seven or eight “military intelligence” agents from the
Department of San Marcos, and “[t]hey ordered him to stop, when he was carrying a
quintal of rice and they beat [him] severely”. Anastasia López Calvo, known as
“Karina”, was captured with him and they were both taken in a pick-up truck to the
military detachment of Santo Domingo, Municipality of San Pablo, Department of San
Marcos.
When they reached the detachment, they were taken to a room, where his “hands
were tied to the wall above him and one of the men who captured [him] began to
beat [him] with a large brick”. When they had finished torturing him, they asked for
information on his camp and the combatants. He was able to identify two of the
Army officers who tortured him.
Subsequently, they were transferred to the military detachment of the community of
El Porvenir, Municipality of San Pablo, Department of San Marcos There, they were
put in another room where they were interrogated and received death threats.
During the night, they were taken to a basement in the detachment, where they
were kept for two days, after which the interrogation continued.
Approximately 10 days later, he was transferred to Military Zone No. 18 in San
Marcos, where the torture and interrogation continued. Here, he could see how the
Army captured and killed civilians. They obliged those they detained to memorize
texts so that they could appear in public and declare that they had given themselves
up to the Army voluntarily, in order to conceal the military practice of using former
guerrillas to obtain information that was relevant for “military intelligence”, by
torturing them.
He was kept in shackles for about six months; during this time the Army took him
out dressed in uniform like a soldier to carry out tasks such as “identifying
combatants [...] or those who sympathized with the guerrilla”. After six month, the
treatment he received changed and his restrictions at the base were reduced.
During all the time that he was detained he was never taken before a judge or an
authority with any formal charge against him.
In February 1992, he was obliged to take part in a unit known as the Quetzal Task
Force which was initially set up at the military bases of San Juan de Loarca in the
Municipality of Tumbador, San Marcos, and then transferred to Santa Ana Berlín, in