Guatemala’s highest court has sentenced five former paramilitaries to 30 years in prison for raping dozens of indigenous Mayan women during the country’s civil war in the 1980s. The men were members of so-called Civil Self-Defence Patrols, armed groups formed and supported by the military. The 36 victims were aged 12-52 when the crimes happened, prosecutors said. “There were massacres. Many women were raped,” said Antonina Vale, a survivor. “It’s the pain we have in our hearts.” Around 200,000 people were killed or disappeared in the 1960-1996 conflict. Most of them were members of indigenous groups, who were targeted by the army and right-wing paramilitaries, accused of supporting left-wing guerrillas. The three-week trial at the Supreme Court in the capital, Guatemala City, included testimony from survivors and relatives of the victims of the Achi indigenous group. The rapes, they said, happened around the village of Rabinal, north of the capital. The area, which was targeted heavily during the war, is the site of a mass grave with the bodies of more than 3,000 people.(BBC)…[+]