Belizean soldiers did not kill Guatemala teen

GUATEMALA CITY: An investigation by independent experts has found that Belizean soldiers did not fatally shoot a Guatemalan teen on the two countries' border in April, officials said on Friday.
The Organization of American States (OAS) commissioned the investigation at the request of both governments after the death of 13-year-old Julio Alvarado on April 20 inflamed long-simmering border tensions.
"The wounds that killed Julio Alvarado were not caused by projectiles from a firearm of the defense forces of Belize," Magdalena Talamas – an Uruguayan who is the OAS's chief official for Belize-Guatemala mediation – told a news conference in Guatemala.
Guatemala had said a Belize patrol fatally shot Alvarado walking home from field labour, also wounding his father and brother.
Belize rejected that version, saying one of its patrols came under fire from Guatemalan civilians and responded in "justifiable self-defense."
The incident prompted Guatemala to deploy 3,000 troops to the disputed border.
Talamas said the OAS investigation showed Alvarado was shot by Belizean environmentalists carrying a rifle and shotgun accompanying the Belizean soldiers after they found the Guatemalans poaching on Belizean territory east of the border, the report said.
There was also evidence that the Guatemalans fired shots at the Belizean soldiers, Talamas said: bullet holes in tree branches showing firing from the family's position.
Although the Belizean soldiers returned fire, they did not hit the Guatemalans, she added.
Each side has long accused the other of a series of other acts of violence.
Guatemala has made claims over more than half of Belize's territory dating back 150 years to when its small neighbour was a British colony known as British Honduras.
Tensions between the two sides have remained strained despite agreement to try to resolve the territorial dispute in the International Court of Justice. — AFP