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spearheading the campaign for justice in Guatemala,challenging the impunity that soldiers and guerrillasconferred on themselves when they made peace. Most ofthe victims of the war were non-combatants. In additionto the dead, 50,000 disappeared and 100,000 weredriven into exile.Father Rigorbuerto Penez: There are no words todescribe the war. It was monstrous, it was like a wild beastthat fell upon the people and devoured them, it was like abroom that swept away all life. Of every ten people whodied in the war, two belonged to armed groups and 8 werechildren. Men, women and children... children torn fromtheir mothers’ wombs and accused of being rotten fruit.(6.3.99 BBC2 Correspondent 1930-2015).The report reveals the significant role played by theU.S. in the violence:Reporter: In the mountains, Guatemala’s dirty war wassupported by American Congressional funding until1990 and by covert C.I.A. funding until 1995. It was awar the West ignored, a war whose worst abuses werecommitted out of sight. The Left Wing Guerrillas fightingmilitary regimes cover in mountains like these and a stateof siege was declared to enable the army to kill legally…Intightly nit communities like IL Puerto, men no differentfrom Manuel were press ganged into village militias thatwere forced to torture and kill friends and relatives. A fewdid it willingly to settle petty squabbles or personalrivalries, most killed rather than be killed. Simple, Godfearingpeople became accomplices in their owndestruction. Now, for the first time they are beingencouraged to talk openly about an era so traumatic, thatneighbour dared not talk to neighbour. Slowly, thetalking is restoring much of the sense of community thatexisted before the war...Some of the greatest abuses werecommitted by village militias, dignified by the name ofCivil Patrols. Juan Castro lives side by side with the menthat murdered two of his family and a friend.The level of violence parallels descriptions of thegenocide in Rwanda recounted in Comic Relief, with‘neighbour killing neighbour’.Interviewee Juan Castro: They locked them up in thisroom and tortured them cruelly for 15 days. When theyasked for food, they gave them excrement, to drink, theygave them urine. They destroyed Gustavo’s face andhacked him here with a machete, the same happened toRedro and Jesus, they died very difficult deaths.Reporter: Almost everyone in this community of 32families has lost someone, some of the people who orderedthe killings, still occupy high office and can influence thecourse of justice...Reconciliation was a wiping clean of theslate. (6.3.99 BBC2 Correspondent 1930-2015)The Correspondent report on Sierra Leone focused ona bar run by an elderly Englishman in the midst of a warzone. The report offered an unusual account of how thebar represents the struggle for normality in the midst ofextreme danger. We are told that ‘this old fashionedEnglishman with his kindness and cold beer, offers ablessed antidote to the pressures of war’ ‘at Paddy’s youcan escape…for a while, you enter a different country.’The report is structured around the viewpoint offrontline players themselves:Reporter: Freetown in time of war. It’s five pm and themercenaries in their choppers fly low over Paddy’s Bar.I’ve known a few war zone bars, but none like this placeand its owner, Paddy Warland…The curfew begins in justone hour so drinking is done quickly...Among thedrinkers, Nigerian soldiers who’ve spent the day on thebattlefield and bodyguards from the British HighCommission on a day off....Juliet and her friends,bargirls, young, poor, dreaming of escape.These are thedoctors who tend the wounded and dying, but at Paddy’syou can escape for a while, you enter a different country.Other reports offer a different perspective ofdeveloping countries which focuses on culturaldifference and the ‘unusual’. On 6 March, Correspondentran a feature on a two year-old boy thought to be thereincarnation of the former President, Premidasa in the‘mystical island of Sri Lanka.’ The report notes:Reporter: These monks are taught that our actions inour life determined whether we come back as a man oran insect in the next. The cycle of reincarnation only endswhen we reach enlightenment. Almost everyone herebelieves in rebirth, the trick is to find out who has comeback as what.... Hanguranketha believes that it has wonthe reincarnation lottery and these people are here tomeet the winning ticket. Sampad, the toddler in white iscelebrating the second birthday in this life, but theybelieve that he’s been here before, not as a poor villageboy, but as a former president. No-one here seems tooconcerned that Sampad’s previous incarnation waskilled by an assassin. His last life ended on this funeralpyre in 1993, President Premidasa was killed by anunknown suicide bomber. With so many enemies, thisreincarnation is more curse than blessing. (6.3.99 BBC21910-1955 Correspondent)The report shows how the ‘inexact science’ ofhypnosis is used to determine the authenticity of theyoung pretender. Yet, there is little authentic in thejudgement, the monks, the people and the politicians all80 DFID – July 2000