GUATEMALA CITY (AP) — Just as Guatemala began to elect magistrates to its highest court on Thursday in a test of strength of its democratic institutions, prosecutors said they raided two voting locations in what lawyers and the country's president said was an attempt to interfere in the elections.
The latest action — carried out by the internationally criticized Attorney General's office — reignited tensions in a yearslong battle to root out endemic corruption plaguing the Central American country's institutions.
Guatemalan President Bernardo Arévalo and his anti-corruption allies have often clashed with prosecutors they accuse of rotting Guatemala’s justice system and making politically motivated arrests.
The agents who carried out the raid were led by Leonor Morales, a prosecutor sanctioned by the United States for trying to overturn Arévalo's presidential win in 2023. Morales has also previously persecuted judicial officials fighting corruption. She refused to provide more information because it was an open investigation.
