Title: EL MOZOTE: la masacre 25 años después
Photographer(s): Susan Meiselas, Pedro Linger Gasiglia
Writer(s): Aryeh Neier, Maria Julia Hernandez, Juan Mendez, Pedro Linger Gasiglia
Designer(s): Valeria Dulitzky, Julieta Ulanovsky
Publisher(s): Pedro Linger Gasiglia, Buenos Aires, Argentina
Year: 2007
Print run:
Language(s): Spanish, English
Pages: 160
Size: 13 x 17 cm
Binding: Softcover
Edition:
Print: Latingrafica, Buenos Aires, Argentina
Nation(s) and year(s) of Protest: El Salvador, 1981
ISBN: 9789870530367
Of all the horrors El Salvador has suffered, the Massacre of El Mozote and surrounding areas is the most terrible chapter: at least 986 people were killed (552 children and 434 adults, including 12 pregnant women) in a bloodbath that lasted from 10 to 12 December.
El Salvador was bleeding to death in a civil war that left at least 75,000 victims. It was a fratricidal struggle between the army and the Farabundo Martí National Liberation Front (FMLN) guerrillas. The military had orders to wipe out what they assumed were "communists" trying to seize power in the country. Peasants were among the main targets, accused of providing protection to the insurgency, which had a strong presence in the area.
"On 11 December, the military passed through La Joya. It was Domingo Monterrosa's army, the Atlacatl battalion. We heard the dogs barking and we got worried. There were soldiers everywhere, a lot of movement. At two o'clock in the afternoon they took out the people who were in Jacinto's house. There were eight children who had taken refuge there. We saw them being dragged away, screaming. One of them was shouting that his mother was in the house and a soldier in command signalled to two soldiers to come in. There was a lady in bed, who had given birth to a baby girl. She was Jacinto's daughter-in-law. We heard the shot when she was killed. Three or four days later we came out from where we were hiding and passed by the house. She was in bed and the girl had a knife buried in her throat. With the blood they wrote on the walls of the room: 'One child dead, one guerrilla less'. She was a little angel. We don't understand why they did it". By Amadeo Martínez survivor of the massacre.
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