Guatemala jails ex-paramilitaries for sexual violence

A Guatemalan court on Friday sentenced three former paramilitaries to 40 years in prison for sexual violence against indigenous women during the country’s civil war in the 1980s.

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The defendants, aged between 53 and 67, were indigenous members of militias tasked by the military to fight leftist guerrillas during a conflict that left an estimated 200,000 dead or missing.

Former Civil Self-Defence Patrol members Pedro Sanchez, Simeon Enriquez and Felix Tum were found guilty of crimes against humanity for sexually assaulting six members of the Achi Mayan ethnic group in the 1980s, Judge Maria Eugenia Castellanos said.

"I am innocent of what they are accusing me of," Sanchez told the court before the sentencing.