operations.9 The CEH registered 626 massacres committed by State forces during the armed conflict10 with the support of patrol groups like the military commissioners,11 the Judiciales,12 and the Civil Self-Defense Patrols (PAC).13 (…) Under the State's National Security Doctrine, the Army came to view the indigenous Mayan population as the "internal enemy,” since they believed that they constituted or potentially constituted the guerrillas' support base.14 2. Displaced persons and refugees in the wake of the armed conflict 40. The CEH stated that the refugees who had returned to live in that community had survived massacres in their own villages of origin in 1982.15 After the armed conflict, survivors of massacres were forced to endure displacement under difficult conditions under even persecution by the perpetrators.16 In that connection, the CEH said: Unprecedented terror, provoked by the massacres and the devastation of complete villages during the period 1981 to 1983, led to the flight en masse of a diverse population, the majority of which was Mayan, but which also included a considerable number of Ladino families. Estimates of the number of displaced persons vary from 500,000 to a million and a half people ..., including those who were displaced internally and those who were obliged to seek refuge abroad.17 (…) The variation in these figures reflects the changing nature of this displacement. About 150,000 people sought safety in Mexico. Almost a third of these settled in camps and were given refugee status by the United Nations High Commissioner For Refugees (UNHCR).18 (…) 9 Annex 1. CEH, Guatemala: Memory of Silence, Conclusions and Recommendations, pars. 65-67. 10 Annex 1. CEH, Guatemala: Memory of Silence, Conclusions and Recommendations, par. 86. Since the early days of the armed confrontation, the military commissioners were the representatives of the Army in each community. Annex 1. CEH, Guatemala: Memory of Silence, Conclusions and Recommendations, par. 80. 11 12 The judiciales were an investigative body of the National Police; during the armed conflict, especially during the most violent years, they largely took their orders from and were controlled by the Army. Annex 1. CEH, Guatemala: Memory of Silence, Conclusions and Recommendations, par. 43. 13 The PAC were the creation of the de facto military regime headed by General Efrain Rios Montt in late 1981. They were part of his plan to exterminate the guerrilla movement by relocating the indigenous population and wiping out “any community or killing any person that his government was suspicious of, using methods that violated human rights.” PACs were first introduced in the Department of El Quiché and then spread to other departments. IACHR, Fourth Report on the Situation of Human Rights in Guatemala, June 1, 1993 Available at: http://www.cidh.org/countryrep/Guatemala93eng/toc.htm. 14 Annex 1. CEH, Guatemala: Memory of Silence, Conclusions and Recommendations, par. 15. 15 Annex 2. CEH, Guatemala: Memory of Silence, Volume VI, Illustrative Cases, Annex 1, Illustrative Case No. 3: Xamán Massacre. 16 Annex 1. CEH, Guatemala: Memory of Silence, Conclusions and Recommendations, pars. 65-67 17 Annex 1. CEH, Guatemala: Memory of Silence, Conclusions and Recommendations, par. 66. 18 Annex 1. CEH, Guatemala: Memory of Silence, Conclusions and Recommendations, par. 66. 7