NEWS & VIEWS
from a CATHOLIC perspective

      WASHINGTON, DC (CWNews.com) - The US State Department on Monday urged Guatemala to renew its efforts to find those responsible for the killing of a Catholic bishop one year ago.

      "We urge Guatemalan authorities to undertake new, vigorous efforts to identify all those involved and to bring them to justice," a US State Department statement said on the first anniversary of the bludgeoning death of Auxiliary Bishop Juan Gerardi Conedera. The bishop was killed two days after releasing a human rights report that blamed the army and its paramilitary allies for most of the deaths during the country's 36-year civil war.

      Although Catholic leaders and human rights groups have urged the government to focus the investigation on the links to the human rights report, investigators have named a priest who lived with the slain bishop as the primary suspect. Last Friday, Special Prosecutor Celvin Galindo requested that DNA tests be performed on 12 military officers and five other people, including Father Mario Orantes Najera, who found Bishop Gerardi's body in the rectory where they both lived and worked.

      The State Department said: "We share the intense frustration of Guatemalans and many others committed to the protection of human rights." It added, "The viciousness of the attack that killed him stunned the entire world."