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The Spatial Dynamics of Genocide
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Keywords: critical geographies of human rights, legal geography, Guatemala, genocide Abstract Type: Paper Abstract
Authors:
Juan José Margos, Impunity Watch Guatemala
Christian Pettersen, Kenyon College
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Abstract
How can an attention to genocidal state practices teach us about the spatial dynamics of violence and reparations? This paper examines the 2024 indictment against Benedicto Lucas García for ordering over 30 massacres and destroying 23 Maya Ixil villages in Guatemala between the years of 1981 and 1982. The charges against Lucas García include genocide, crimes against humanity, enforced disappearances, and sexual violence that are territorially and temporally limited to the Maya Ixil region. Historical evidence demonstrates that the Guatemalan military’s violence extended beyond Guatemalan borders; military governments facilitated illegal adoptions from massacred families as part of their broader counterinsurgency strategy. Attending to the transnational effects of genocide has the potential to extend the spatial valence of human rights crime and directs our attention to new legal avenues through which reparations can be imagined and made.