Alvarez Ruiz, Donaldo

He graduated from the University of San Carlos . As a lawyer, he worked as a lawyer. Adhered to extreme right - wing political views, was a member of the Institutional Democratic Party ( PID ). He was PID Secretary General and Member of Parliament.

The ultra-conservative PID has been an alliance with the ultra-right National Liberation Movement ( MLN ). Donaldo Ruiz Alvarez was associated with the " death squad " Mano Blanca , compiled for the militants lists to be "disappeared" ^[1] .

Donaldo Alvarez is certainly a first-level leader. He started as a young lawyer, was a political operative of the military. He himself proposed the Institutional Democratic Party, with which, he said, linked his life as a group legitimizing the military regime ^[2] .

In the 1974 election, PID — MLN candidate General Eugenio Lauherud was elected president of Guatemala . On August 1, 1976, Laucherud appointed Ruiz Alvarez as Minister of the Interior. Alvarez Ruiz was in charge of the National Police and off-army intelligence.

As Interior Minister, Alvarez Ruiz became one of the leading figures in the civil war in Guatemala in the second half of the 1970s and early 1980s. Alvarez Ruiz formed an extensive network of informants and contributed to the terror of ultra-right organizations (Mano Blanca, Secret Anti-Communist Army ) against pro-communist and left-wing activists. Acted in close official cooperation with the Director of the National Police Herman Chupina Baraona .

Alvarez Ruiz is responsible for a number of political killings ^[3] - in particular, the leader of the left student movement Oliverio Castañeda, the former mayor of Guatemala, the Social Democrat Manuel Colom, the opposition journalist Irma Flacker ^[4] (with whom he maintained personal friendly relations for many years ^{[5] ]} ).

On January 31, 1980, a group of Indian peasants and leftist students took up the territory of the Spanish Embassy in Guatemala in protest against repression. Despite the ambassador’s request to enter into negotiations, President Lucas García, Minister Alvarez Ruiz and Police Director Chupina Baraona decided to use force. The embassy building was set on fire by police special forces ^[6] , 36 people were killed in the fire, the only surviving protester was kidnapped from the hospital and killed. Donaldo Alveres Ruiz made not only a political decision, but also was personally present at the burning with weapons in his hands ^[7] .

On March 23, 1982, General Efrain Rios Montt made a military coup. Rios Montt belonged to a different military group ("clique of fanatical evangelists " ^[8] ) than Lucas Garcia and his entourage. The leaders of the former regime were eliminated from politics. Donaldo Alvarez Ruiz left Guatemala. In 1983 - 1989, Alvarez Ruiz lived in the United States , then moved to Mexico .

In December 1999, the Guatemalan human rights activist Rigoberta Menchu (her father Vicente Menchu ​​died while the Spanish Embassy was burned) appealed to the National Court of Spain with a request to bring to justice a group of Guatemalan military and police, including Alvarez Ruiz. Since 2004, an international warrant has been in force for his arrest on charges of Mayan genocide and the organization of political killings ^[9] . However, attempts to detain in the US and Mexico have not yielded results ^[10] . Since 2012, Donaldo Alvarez Ruiz has been hiding from the international wanted list, his whereabouts are not known for certain ^[11] . Moreover, in Guatemala itself, the warrant for his arrest was canceled in 2007 by a decision of the Constitutional Court.