Carlos Manuel Arana Osorio

Who was Carlos Manuel Arana Osorio?

Carlos Manuel Arana Osorio was President of Guatemala from 1 July 1970 to 1 July 1974.

Carlos Arana was born in Barberena, in the department of Santa Rosa. A colonel in the Army, he was elected in an electoral process generally considered "non-transparent" on a platform promising a crackdown on law-and-order issues and stability; his vice president was Eduardo Cáceres. In November 1970, Arana imposed a "State of Siege" which was followed by heightened counterinsurgency measures. The government received continued large-scale military support from the United States, which provided weapons, technical support and military advisors to the security forces under Arana to assist in fighting the guerrillas. The systematic use of state-terrorism which emerged in 1966 under President Julio César Méndez persisted under Arana; government-sponsored "death squads" remained active and the security forces regularly detained, disappeared, tortured and extrajudicially executed political opponents, student leaders, suspected guerrilla sympathizers and trade unionists. It is estimated that over 20,000 Guatemalans were killed or "disappeared" under the Arana administration.