39
142.
On the other hand, this Tribunal has signaled that the freedom of movement and
residence may be vulnerable to restrictions de facto if the State has not established the
conditions nor foreseen the means that would permit it to be exercised,155 for example
when a person is a victim of threats and harassments and the State does not provide the
necessary guarantees so that they can move and reside freely in the territory where these
actions took place, including when the threats and harassments come from non-state
actors.156
143. In the present case, the Court notes that the next of kin of Florencio Chitay Nech had
to escape from their community in order to protect their lives against the grave threats and
constant persecutions that they suffered along with the other close members of the
community, which are framed in the context of systematic violence, characterized by the
implementation of the “Doctrine of National Security” by the part of the State against the
indigenous Mayan groups and their political leaders in particular. (supra paras. 64, 108,
121, 123, 124).
144. This situation of harassment continued even after the move and affected various
members of the extended family and other figures of the municipality. In this regard, the
father of Florencio Chitay Nech, Pedro Chitay, and his brother, Jose Carlos Chitay Nech,
had been victims of kidnapping in 1985; Eleodoro Onion Camay, husband of the sister of
Florencio, had been kidnapped and murdered in 1988; Martin Chitay was kidnapped and
murdered in 1990, and his sister, Rose Chitay Aguin, had been assassinated together with
her new-born son in a massacre that occurred in the neighborhood of Semetabaj.
Together with the aforementioned, as was indicated in the Report of the CEH, on
November 21, 1980, Felipe Alvarez, municipal mayor of San Martín Jilotepeque had been
the victim of a forced disappearance and his children were beaten, and then three of his
children were disappeared.157 Also, on January 6, 1981, the forced disappearance of Mario
Augusto Garcia Roca, the Second Council of the Municipality of San Martin Jilotepeque took
place.158
145. Additionally, this Tribunal finds that the forced disappearance affected the members
of the Chitay Rodriguez family in a particularly grave manner due to their connection with
the Mayan indigenous group. As recognized by the expert witness Rosalina Tuyuc, the
energetic connection with the land has a fundamental importance in the Mayan vision, for
which the abandonment of the community not only was made material for the families that
had to flee, but also signified a greater cultural and spiritual loss. She stated that:
Many of the sons of the farm workers, or of the Mayans, have their principal connection with
Mother Earth […] For the vision of the Mayan peoples, principally this is the connection with the
land, with the air, with the water, with the forests, and when one is outside of the community, he
or she has practically no energetic connection, and it is this that many of the thousands and
hundreds of orphan sons now do not know because the movement of these energies, for having
155
Cf. Case of the Moiwana Community V. Suriname, supra note 151, paras. 119 and 120; Case of the
Mapiripan Massacre V. Colombia, supra note 14, para. 170, and Case Valle Jaramillo V. Colombia. Merits,
Reparations and Costs. Judgment of 27 of November of 2008. Series C No. 192, para. 139.
156
Cf. Case Valle Jaramillo V. Colombia, supra note 155, para. 139.
157
Cf. CEH, Guatemala: Memory of Silence, supra note 35, Tome VIII, Annex II, Case No. 707.
158
Cf. CEH, Guatemala: Memory of Silence, supra note 35, Tome VIII, Annex II, Case No. 707.
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