GUATEMALA CITY — A Guatemalan lawmaker and three police officers were killed in an armed attack in the eastern department of Zacapa, President Bernardo Arévalo said, condemning the violence and ordering security forces to help identify those responsible, Reuters reported on Saturday, November 7.

Source: Reuters via SRN News

Lawmaker Julio César Portillo Paz was attacked on Friday, November 6, in Río Hondo, Zacapa, and initially taken to a hospital with serious injuries. His death was later confirmed by the National Unity of Hope party, or UNE, to which he belonged, Reuters reported. Guatemala's Congress also lamented the death of Portillo Paz, its Zacapa representative, in a post on X, according to Deutsche Welle reporting. Early local reports on Friday had said the lawmaker escaped unharmed — accounts that were overtaken by the party's confirmation that he died in hospital.

Arévalo said the three National Civil Police officers killed in the attack had died in the line of duty and instructed security forces to cooperate with prosecutors investigating the killings. 'We will not allow criminal violence to prevail over the lives and safety of Guatemalans,' Arévalo said in a post on X. The Interior Ministry said the officers died while repelling what it called a direct attack against the lawmaker, in earlier reporting of the ambush.

Source: Reuters; AP reporting via News Central

What is not known

Authorities have not disclosed a motive for the attack or identified who was responsible, Reuters reported. Zacapa, in Guatemala's east, is a department where drug-trafficking activity is entrenched, and the attack took place on the Atlantic highway corridor near Río Hondo, according to local reporting — but no official statement has attributed the ambush to any group, and no connection to organised crime has been established by investigators in the reporting available.

The second prominent killing in three weeks

The killing comes about three weeks after former anti-corruption prosecutor Juan Francisco Solórzano Foppa was shot dead in Guatemala City, a case that heightened concerns over organised crime's influence and the possible return of politically motivated assassinations, Reuters reported. Authorities have not established a connection between the two attacks.

What happens next

Prosecutors are investigating the killings with the security forces Arévalo has ordered to assist. The tests ahead are whether investigators name suspects and a motive, and whether the government can show the two prominent killings in three weeks are isolated attacks rather than a pattern — the question now hanging over Guatemala's politics a year before its next general elections cycle gathers pace. Awaaz Punjab will follow official updates from the prosecutor's office and the presidency.