Girl soldiers in guatemala

Abstract

In 1996, a peace agreement was signed between the government of Guatemala and the guerrilla movement Unidad Revolucionaria Nacional Guatemalteca (URNG). The armed conflict in Guatemala had then lasted for 36 years. Its main character was that of a war fought between a small guerrilla movement and a strongly superior national army. The armed conflict was extremely bloody during the period 1980-1983, when the army carried out its major counterinsurgency campaign and slaughtered large parts of the indigenous population in the western and central highlands. The Guatemalan armed conflict has been fraught with foreign intervention, access to weapons and military training, mainly in the context of the Cold War.