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On February 9, 2022, the Supreme Court of Justice declared admissible the request to strip Judge Pablo Xitumul de Paz of his judicial immunity, leaving him vulnerable to impeachment. Pablo Xitumul de Paz is the judge of the First Court of Criminal Sentencing, Drug Trafficking and Crimes against the Environment, with jurisdiction to hear high-risk cases of group "C".
The international organizations that make up the International Observatory on Guatemala have warned on multiple occasions about repeated attacks and criminalization against justice operators in Guatemala. These attacks are part of a systematic pattern that has been worsening, and that has as a common denominator, the use of the criminal justice and disciplinary systems to undermine the independence of judges and prosecutors who oversee highly complex criminal investigations and prosecutions that affect powerful individuals and groups and that involve serious human rights violations or large-scale corruption.
Read our joint statement here.
