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Ahead of Guatemala’s Elections, an Exodus Continues

By Rich Brown

Journalists, judges and prosecutors are leaving the country as repression is expected to intensify, regardless of who wins the June 25 election.

GUATEMALA CITY — In March, Rony Ríos got into a vehicle in the middle of the night to leave the country. He was a reporter for elPeriódico, one of the country’s most important investigative outlets, which published its final edition on May 15. Its director, José Rubén Zamora, continues to languish in prison after 10 months without a conviction. Four of Zamora’s lawyers have themselves been arrested, and the Public Ministry (MP) has ordered investigations into at least nine journalists, claiming their coverage of the trial may amount to obstruction of justice. Ríos was one of...

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