This context of the pandemic has provoked an aggravation of the agrarian conflict with an increase in threats of evictions of various communities, as well as attacks against leaders who defend the right to land and territory, especially in the departments of Alta and Baja Verapaz. An example of this was the eviction in April of more than 36 indigenous Mayan Poqomchi' families from the community of Washington (Purulhá, Baja Verapaz). This is a paradigmatic case as it was the first eviction executed during the State of Calamity, despite the announcement that all eviction orders were suspended. It was carried out by non-state actors and therefore without the presence of public security forces or the authorities responsible for ensuring respect for human rights. It was perpetrated with violence: homes were burned, crops were destroyed, the evicted families were prevented from taking their belongings with them and they were not relocated. In October, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) granted precautionary protection measures to the families and requested that the State of Guatemala implement the necessary measures to protect their right to life and personal integrity.

Among the organizations accompanied by PBI in the department of Alta Verapaz alone, there are more than 1,000 arrest warrants against community leaders and there are communities with more than 40 arrest warrants. These people, in order not to risk being captured, remain in their communities without leaving, which prevents them from accessing health and education centers and local markets to sell their products, all of which contributes to their impoverishment and the precariousness of their lives and those of their families. In this regard, we note the case of María Cuc Choc, sentenced at the end of June 2022 to 2 years in prison, commutable to 2 years for aggravated usurpation. The defender was accused for an event recorded on December 19, 2016, an eviction against 58 Q'eqchí' families from the Chab'il Ch'och' community. Her community work as an interpreter from Mayan Q'eqchí' to Spanish on behalf of the evicted families was used by the company Lisbal, S.A., which accused her of usurping a farm that historically belonged to the community, for which she was falsely accused, according to the Mesoamerican Women Defenders Initiative IM-Defensoras.