Manuel Boton Uz was four years old when he was abducted during a military attack on his Indigenous community in Quiche, northwestern Guatemala, in 1982 amid the country’s prolonged internal armed conflict. While his siblings were eventually located and reunited with relatives, Boton Uz became one of over 100 children who disappeared between 1960 and 1996, a period marked by violent clashes between the Guatemalan army and guerrilla forces.

Guatemala’s civil war resulted in the deaths of more than 200,000 people and the disappearance of an estimated 45,000 others. A United Nations-backed truth commission found that the Guatemalan military was responsible for most of the human rights violations during the conflict and determined that state forces committed acts of genocide against Indigenous populations.

Information about Boton Uz, like many others affected by the war, has primarily been preserved through the National Reparations Program, a government initiative that has compiled thousands of testimonies detailing grave abuses. These accounts are stored in hundreds of large blue plastic containers and document a wide range of violations including extrajudicial killings, murders, sexual violence, forced disappearances, and the coercive recruitment of civilians—including children—by armed groups.

As the country approaches the end of President Bernardo Arévalo’s progressive administration in January 2028, officials and human rights advocates say there is an urgent need to preserve the extensive archive of approximately 60,000 case files. The effort aims to safeguard evidence of past atrocities, underpin truth and justice initiatives, and prevent the loss of crucial documentation amid political transitions.

Guatemala continues to grapple with the legacy of its armed conflict, balancing the demands for accountability with the challenges of maintaining and protecting sensitive documentation that records decades of suffering. The preservation of these testimonies is seen as a vital component in supporting victims’ rights and fostering reconciliation in a nation still healing from its violent past.