Bruno Kreisky Foundation

for Human Rights

Yolanda Urízar Martínez de Aguilar (Guatemala)

Missing (Disappeared)

Yolanda Urízar Martínez de Aguilar is a famous lawyer, who worked for many years in Guatemala as legal counsel for the union „Central Nacional de Trabajadores“ or CNT. She advocates for underprivileged groups especially. In April of 1979 she was arrested because she passed out fliers about International Year of Children. Afterwards she was exiled to Mexico.

After the end of the siege on March 23, 1983, Yolanda Urizar returned from Mexico. On March 26, 1983, just shortly after crossing the Guatemalan border she was arrested by the secret police and disappeared.

The secret police, however, deny that they ever arrested her. In her line of work Urizar continually fought for the rights of workers, as well as the basic principles of human rights. The Bruno Kreisky Foundation awarded her the prize to help draw public attention to the dramatic fate of Yolanda Urizar.