A Guatemalan court sentenced three former paramilitaries each to 40 years in prison for crimes against humanity for raping six Indigenous Maya Achi women between 1981 and 1983, at the height of Guatemala’s bloody, U.S.-backed genocide. This is survivor Paulina Ixpata, speaking after the sentence was announced.

Paulina Ixpata: “I feel very good because we achieved justice, because we are not lying. We lived through it — not just me, other women, too. There are other women who are no longer with us. They died. They didn’t have the opportunity to see this justice. But we also hope that we get dignified reparations, because it is a government obligation.”

A separate trial in 2022 convicted five other paramilitaries for raping Maya Achi women. At least 36 Maya Achi survivors have come forward to accuse U.S.-funded paramilitaries and soldiers of rape during the war. Twenty-nine survivors are still alive, including those in this most recent case.