The term “narco-terrorist” has been weaponized just as the word “communist” was in the past, Guatemalan Nobel Peace Prize laureate Rigoberta Menchu told AFP in an interview.
The 67-year-old Indigenous activist, who survived the massacre of her family during Guatemala’s civil war, has not given up on the United Nations’ ability to resolve conflict in a world where artificial intelligence has exacerbated the fallout of war.
Mexico-based Menchu said terrorist accusations thrown around in Latin America acted as a “smokescreen” to crush left-wing opposition.
“How many people did they kill because they said they were communists, how many rules did they crush because they said they were communists?” the law professor said.
In the 1970s and 1980s, six Latin American dictatorships (Argentina, Chile, Uruguay, Paraguay, Bolivia, and Brazil) joined forces to eliminate left-wing opponents under “Operation Condor,” with tacit US support.
The current narco-terrorist discourse “is the same old spiel that replaced what used to be called communism,” she believes.
The 1992 Nobel Peace Prize winner, visiting her home country for the launch of the Guatemala Book Fair, still believes in the UN’s capacity to broker peace.
“I don’t see any other body that could replace the UN,” she said, acknowledging the organization’s flaws but insisting that “it’s the only thing we’ve got.”
Menchu slammed the US-Israeli offensive on Iran, which has ravaged the Middle East since its launch in February.
“What they’re doing in Iran is opening such an incredible door that we don’t know how many victims it will claim around the entire world,” she said, alluding to rapidly advancing technology that is supersizing the damage wrought by war.
She also praised Cuban steadfastness in the face of US President Donald Trump’s desire to turn the island into his “estate.”
“I don’t have a formula, but I know that the Cuban people have already spent almost 70 years resisting an invasion, and they’re still standing strong,” she said, referring to decades-long US pressure on the Caribbean island.
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