An Ixil Indian woman, the relative of a civil war victim, uses earphones to hear translations between Spanish and the Ixil language during the genocide trial of former dictator Jose Efrain Rios Montt in Guatemala City, Thursday, May 9, 2013.GUATEMALA CITY – Efrain Rios Montt ruled as Guatemala’s dictator, served as president of Congress, preached as an evangelical pastor and now, at 86, has become the first Latin American strongman to stand trial and be convicted on genocide charges in his own country.
A three-member tribunal also found Rios Montt guilty of crimes against humanity and sentenced him to 80 years in prison.
Enigmatic, with a stern face and a thunderous voice, he began his career in the Guatemalan army in 1946 as a cadet, rising to the rank of brigadier general in 1972.
He first tried to become president in 1974, losing an election that many believe was stolen from him amid allegations of fraud. Then in March 1982, he seized power after a military coup and began an 18-month reign during the bloodiest phase in Guatemala’s 36-year civil war.
It was during this time that most of the hundreds of massacres against Maya Indians committed by the army were carried out as part of the U.S.-backed military’s scorched-earth offensive against a leftist uprising based in the Mayan heartland.