GUATEMALA UNDER SEIGE (Part One): Authorities Declare State of Emergency

Guatemala is under siege, according to the national government, which has declared a 30-day state of emergency after gang members from the notorious Barrio 18 street gang mutinied across three prison facilities in the Guatemalan capital on early Saturday.

Inmates took 49 hostages during the rebellions, seizing control of three major prisons as the national government continues to reject prisoner demands to transfer the gang’s top echelon to lower-security facilities in and around the capital of Guatemala City.

For several years, prison riots have resulted in numerous deaths in a region where local criminal groups hold tremendous influence over Guatemalan detention facilities. Gang organizations like the Barrio 18 street gang and MS-13 often conduct their criminal enterprises behind bars with the complicity of the local prison guards.

At dawn on Sunday, members of the National Civil Police (PNC), with the support of the Guatemalan Armed Forces, entered the compound of Renovación 1, a maximum-security prison located in Escuintla, about 75km (45 miles) south of Guatemala City, apprehending mutineers and freeing those taken hostage by the gangs.

Security forces also regained control of two other prison facilities with a large inmate population of known and suspected gang members from the Barrio 18 street gang and Mara Salvatrucha (MS-13).

Guatemalan security forces apprehended the ring-leader of the riots, identified as Aldo Dupie, alias “El Lobo”– or The Wolf–taking the gang boss into custody. El Lobo was recently transferred to the maximum-security prison as part of the government’s efforts to regain control of the capital’s prison facilities and to root out rampant corruption and collusion by local prison guards.

The government of Guatemalan President Bernardo Arévalo has received criticism from residents since taking office in January of 2024 for what critics call a soft-on-crime approach. The Guatemalan homicide rate has been on a steady decline compared to previous years, when murders reached their peak in 2009 with 46 killings per 100,000, however, the proliferation of gangland supremacy, rampant crime, robberies, and drug-fueled violence as gangs compete for territory has remained a persistent problem for the Arévalo administration.

Local police and army forces also freed a total of 28 additional hostages from Fraijanes II prison and another nine at Preventivo in the capital’s eastern territory.