Human Rights Watch's letter to the Guatemalan president

Human Rights Watch has posted a letter to the president of Guatemala on the upcoming selection of justice officials that does a good job surveying the progress and challenges of the last few years in light of fight over the next attorney general and new members of the Supreme Court.

We are writing to follow up on the discussion we had with you in Guatemala City last week. We appreciated your openness to dialogue and felt the exchange of ideas was useful. We would now like to share further concerns regarding the upcoming selection of an attorney general and members of the Supreme Court, based on our review of the nominating procedures that are currently in place.

As you know, we were very disappointed by the Constitutional Court’s decision to cut short the term of Attorney General Claudia Paz y Paz. The Guatemalan Constitution clearly states that the attorney general’s term lasts four years, and the executive order appointing Paz y Paz in December 2010 explicitly said that she was to serve a four-year term. Yet the Constitutional Court ruled—with no explanation—that her term would expire in May, after only three years and five months in office.

We believe the Court’s ruling has done serious damage to the credibility of Guatemala’s justice system. Whether this damage can be undone will now depend in large measure on how the nomination processes for the attorney general and judicial posts are carried out. Unfortunately, there is good reason to fear that they will not go well. The stakes for Guatemala could not be higher.

Read the rest of the letter.