I drew this back in 1982 a few hours after the army left Nebaj. It's another village of the Ichil Triangle which I visited several times and where I also lived for some periods. I'm inside the church - which is full of men - it's a small church - a Spanish church about 400 years old. This drawing shows some men who are standing outside the church listening to the words of the priest. 2 hours passed since the army left after kidnapping four women. They were taken away in a truck and afterwards they beat five men in public in the little square in front of the church - one of these five men died afterwards from his wounds....  
 
     This is something the soldiers did and still do frequently - they enter the village and without anybody saying anything - because that's not even necessary - and these people haven't even done anything wrong - they point out some of the persons and humiliate them in public... In this particular case they touched the women all over - they touched them all over - and then in public they beat some of the men who had been interfering....  
 
      When people are beaten like this in public, it's not just one punch in the face or in the stomach - no, no - they are really beaten - they are beaten in places of the body, where only those who have been trained to beat like this, know how to hit.... That is - in the kidneys - in the liver - in the heart - in solar plexus - in the neck - all of this meaning that the victim often gets serious problems later on. The four women were probably found the following day somewhere close to the village - tortured, violated and killed... No doubt about that...  
 
      I came along a couple of hours and went immediately into the church where I drew this representation of some men who all have their eyes closed - introverted - and yet together...  
 
      Together in their experience of the violence - this affects the WHOLE population. This means that the public humiliation is part of a very clever strategy through which - the soldiers think that just by scaring these people, they can prevent them from becoming guerrilla-soldiers - that's their motivation - and that's what the soldiers are trained for....  
 
 
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