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Thousands of people, many in traditional Indian dress, filed past Bishop Juan Gerardi’s coffin Tuesday, mourning the cleric who was slain two days after delivering a scathing human-rights assessment of the army.
Gerardi, 75, the leading human-rights activist in Guatemala’s Roman Catholic Church, had tried for years to protect the nation’s Indian peasants.
On Friday, he issued a report blaming the army for nearly 80 percent of the 150,000 killings during Guatemala’s 36-year civil war, which ended in 1996. On Sunday, he was killed, bashed in the head with a concrete block in his garage at San Sebastian Church.
On Tuesday, police could report no motive nor suspects.
