Guatemala

2015: Attended the state consultations on the SSD in Geneva – led by Norway.

Sustained engagement in NY (Diya) and Gva (Norway) throughout SSD consultations and ahead of SC CAAC open debates. Supportive in NY but non-committal in Gva. Attended Oslo as observer; still assessing implications of endorsing.

June 2015: Exchanges with MFA in capital for a possible visit in July, but didn’t materialize (MFA argued unavailbility). MoD seems to have concerns with the Guidelines. However, has been consistently supportive of the issue in open debates and even made a positive mention of the SSD at the last one. Outreach letter sent in advance of August CAAC Open Debate.

August 2016: CAAC Open Debate: “We recognize the growing support for the Safe Schools Declaration and its Guidelines. Guatemala is in the process of confirming its endorsement of the Guidelines.”

January 2017: GCPEA met with GVA mission. She explained that endorsement had gotten held up in capital because they were a little confused about how to endorse. They didn’t understand the idea of a political commitment that they had to sign. Felt that made it more than a political commitment, but less than a treaty. Bede explained the different ways it was possible to endorse. She also said they needed agreement from their MoD. Bede offered to send her the sample endorsement letter and the examples in Spanish of military policies that we sent to Argentina.

March 2017: Attended Buenos Aires Conference on Safe Schools.

April 2017: Zama and Cristal met with New York Mission. They view endorsement as possible, but say there is just a hold up in the process. Recommended writing a letter to MFA with MoD in copy.

April 2017: GCPEA wrote to MoD with MFA in copy.

May 2017: The Ministry of Defense of Argentina wrote to Guatemala’s Ministry of Defense to encourage endorsement.

October 2017: GCPEA met with the expert in Geneva. Asked for an update, in light of Guatemala’s announcement at the 2016 Open Debate that the government was in the process of endorsing. The expert advised that the legal department of the MoD had reservations. The expert recommended trying to get the issue on the agenda of their national IHL committee. GCPEA followed up in writing and shared the Open Debate letter.

October 2017: Human Rights Watch made a submission to the Committee on the Rights of the Child, asking the Committee to ask the government what concrete steps it has taken to prevent military use of schools, and to encourage Guatemala to endorse the Declaration. GCPEA shared this with the expert in the Geneva Mission.

December 2017: Meeting in Spain: The representative emphasised how his country is facing the same challenges even though not in an armed conflict, and urged us to pay attention to situations of insecurity. I replied that GCPEA does focus on this in our broader work, that Norway and Argentina had confined the scope of the Declaration to armed conflict, but that we would suggest that the measures and tools are equally applicable and useful. He was pleased when I mentioned our research on the Northern Triangle. I spoke with him afterwards and he said he hoped Guatemala would endorse. I advised him of how Guatemala had said they were in the process of endorsement at the 2016 open debate but that it still has not come through.

February 2018: In advance of OPAC turns 18 event, GCPEA issued letter highlighting that Guatemala has signed OPAC, Paris, and Vancouver, but not the Declaration, and calling for endorsement.

June 2018: Zama met with Minister Counsellor Andres Molina who was very supportive of the SSD and committed to facilitating an endorsement. He noted the many regional endorsements. Noted that we’d need to reach the Ministers of Defense and Foreign Affairs, but felt that we could make the endorsement happen in the next few months. We need to reach Carla Rodriguez, Guatemala’s ambassador in Geneva. Molina promised to set up a video conference with Zama with MFA and MoD.

June 2018: Gisela met with Ambassador Rodriguez, PM in Geneva. The Ambassador explained that the MoD had the following reservations: Soft law compliance concerns of the Declaration and confusion on the Guidelines’ scope. The Declaration and the Guidelines are applicable in armed conflict and Guatemala experiences problems of violence and crime. Practical difficulties, e.g. on peacekeeping obligations- Guatemala’s armed forces are under foreign peacekeeper’s commands. Why other countries did not endorse the Safe Schools Declaration? Guatemala is concerned that Mexico hasn’t supported the Declaration. They have a long and porous border with Mexico where border control forces from both countries collaborate to ensure security and to deter human and drug trafficking, and illegal immigration. The MoD has other more pressing priorities to deal with. Terminology confusion: H.E. Mrs. Rodriguez highlighted that in Spanish the translation for ‘’endorse’’ to ‘’adherirse’’ raises not only political but legal commitments. We looked together at the Spanish language used in the Argentina’s invitation for the conference in Buenos Aires in which ‘’adherirse’’ was not used. However, in the report in Spanish written by the First Secretary about the discussion with the GCPEA in January 2017, appears the translation of ‘‘formulario de adhesion’’ for the ‘’letter of endorsement’’. This explained why the endorsement had gotten held up in capital and they were a little confused about process of endorsement. Proposals on how to convince MoD to support the Declaration: Argentina MoD to reach out to Guatemala MoD to discuss the practical and operational implementation of the Declaration. Share with the MoD the positive implementation examples from endorsing states in Central and Latin American region which were mentioned by the GCPEA during the meeting. Make sure that non-endorsing states are invited to the international conferences on the Declaration.

June 2018: We sent a letter to encourage endorsement ahead of the SC Open Debate. They also asked for the endorsement letter template in Spanish which was sent to Cecilia, First Secretary.

July 2018: A videoconference briefing by Zama for the MFA and MoD is arranged for 24 July.

July 2018: STC provded trainings on the SSD and SC’s work on the protection of schools in conflict. Both in Colombia, with programmes colleagues, the “border team” working on the humanitarian crisis at the border the Venezuela and the field staff in Arauca. And with other LAC colleagues – among them people from Honduras, Mexico, Guatemala, El Salvador and Nicaragua.Guatemala: they are also going to support SC study and also willing to support the work with Guatemala government for endorsment.

July 2018: Guatemala co-sponsored resolution 2427 (2018).Also joined the statement of Canada on behalf of the GoF which mentioned the Safe Schools Declaration during the SC open debate on children and armed conflict.

July 2018: Zama had a videoconference with reps from NY, Geneva, and 3 reps from the MOFA in Guatemala city, including the director of human rights (who led the meeting), someone from the law department.They have secured support from the ministries of education and defense and sent it to their MOFA department of treaties for review. They see no obstacles to signing. The questions were as expected and mostly were variations of “How can we be sure that this applies only to situations of armed conflict and will never, ever be applied to gang or other violence?” I explained that 1) this was the intent of the document and is clear from the reference to armed conflict in almost every para 2) it’s evident in how the endorsing states have interpreted it 3) they can say this in their endorsement letter if they would like. They also wanted a better term in Spanish for “endorsement” – thanks to Nevena and Gisela, I had a whole handful to suggest. They latched onto the idea of all of Latin America by Spain and asked for conference reports from the previous 2. Zama sent a follow-up email to welcome the good news that the ministries of defense and education both support endorsement and inform them about two upcoming opportunities to announce endorsement publicly: Nelson Mandela Peace Summit in September and WPS Open Debate in October.

October 2018: UN WPS open debate advocacy in New York: Gisela met with Andrès Molina, Minister Counsellor, Zama’s contact who said tha the green light was obtained from all Ministries. However, the legal department in the MFA is still reviewing the documents. Spain would be influential, as they are working together on a resolution at UNGA. During the 2017 open debate, on preventing war and sustaining peace, Guatemala had stressed the importance of taking proactive measures before, during, and after conflict. He said they would refer to the issue or protection of education in the draft of the statement for the open debate that they send to capital. He responded well to the idea of announcing endorsement at the open debate. He thought it would be helpful if organisations based in Guatemala would lobby the Directorates of Human Rights and Multilateral. Follow-up: Letter for Foreign Minister and gender recommendations sent by email. GCPEA flagged up to Spain in Geneva to do peer advocacy to Guatemala.

March 2019: Save the Children New York Advocacy Office met with the Minister Counsellor of the Permanent Mission of Guatemala who said that endorsement looks likely by the end of the year. Any delay now is due to slow government processes, but the Minister Counsellor advised that they are taking steps to speed up the process. He shared options for them to announce publicly endorsement– potentially at the UN Security Council on Protection of Civilians in Armed Conflict in May or around the Third International Conference in Palma de Mallorca. He said it would be helpful if we could support in applying pressure for an announcement to be made as quickly as possible with advocacy in Geneva and from capital. He flagged that they have a new colleague in Geneva called Maria Jose and it would be good for us to meet with her to get pressure to come from there too.

March 2019: attended GCPEA side-event on “Better Protecting Women and Girls from Attacks on Education” in Geneva.

May 2019: Participated in the Third International Conference in Palma.

October 2021: cosponsored UNSRC2601.

November 2022: Endorsed the Political Declaration on Strengthening the Protection of Civilians from the Humanitarian Consequences Arising from the Use of Explosive Weapons in Populated Areas (EWIPA) on 18 November during an International Conference hosted by Ireland, the leader and penholder behind the Declaration.