Guatemala military denies involvement in civilian killings
Guatemala's military on Monday denied involvement in attacks that left at least seven people dead, including two women and a girl, in an incident where gunmen in military garb were filmed roaming the street.
The army blamed Sunday's killings in the town of Huite, around 130 kilometers (80 miles) east of the capital Guatemala City, on rival drug trafficking gangs.
The female victims were found dead in a pick-up truck at the entrance to the town, the public prosecutor's office said.
Four adult men were also found dead in other locations, the prosecutors said.
Army spokeswoman Nathalia Mollinedo, in a video posted on X, said the violence was the result of "territorial disputes between transnational crime organizations."
Mollinedo was reacting to questions raised over videos shared by local media of unidentified men in combat gear brandishing rifles around a white pick-up truck at the entrance to the town.
She denied that the men were soldiers.
The military "decided not to enter (the town) at that time in order to avoid escalating the conflict," she said.
Interior Minister Marco Antonio Villeda reacted more cautiously when asked by reporters about that possibility that Guatemalan or allied US forces had opened fire on civilians in the town.
He said he preferred not to "offer an opinion without first having more information about exactly what happened."
"That is what we are going to investigate...that is the information I need to obtain," he said, while denying any police involvement.
The bloodshed comes less than a week after the United States and Guatemala announced an agreement to jointly prosecute organized crime gangs, drug cartels and "narco-politicians."
In the last week, Guatemala also received its first shipment of arms from the United States in half a century, following Washington's lifting of an arms embargo imposed during the country's civil war.
Guatemala is a member of US President Donald Trump's anti-cartel "Shield of the Americas" alliance.
