Interview with Guatemalan Nobel Prize Winner Rigoberta Menchu

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(16 Mar 2007) SHOTLIST • 1. Wide of Presidential Candidate and Nobel Peace Prize winner Rigoberta Menchu being photographed • 2. Close of Menchu • 3. SOUNDBITE (Spanish) Rigoberta Menchu, Guatemalan Presidential Candidate and Nobel Peace Prize Winner: • We come in peace. We come with a culture of tolerance, respect and friendship. We have come with a vision of inclusion, we will include everyone who is not corrupt or connected to drug trafficking with our project. • 4. Photographers taking pictures of Menchu • 5. Cutaway of Menchu • 6. SOUNDBITE (Spanish) Rigoberta Menchu, Guatemalan Presidential Candidate and Nobel Peace Prize Winner: • We are going to win the presidency. If any candidate runs seeking the presidency, it is in order to win, not lose. We have already won because we have already gained seats in Congress. • 7. Close of Menchu's hands • 8. SOUNDBITE (Spanish) Rigoberta Menchu, Guatemalan Presidential Candidate and Nobel Peace Prize Winner: • Now is the time to measure to what extent Guatemala is haunted by its own demons, which lead to racism, discrimination and exclusion. • 9. Reporters interviewing Menchu • STORYLINE • Nobel Peace Prize winner and presidential hopeful Rigoberta Menchu said Thursday, that her candidacy is opening doors for Guatemala's Mayan Indians and shows how far the country has advanced in building democracy and battling racism. • A small, non-Indian elite has long ruled the impoverished Central American nation of 12 (m) million where 42 percent of the population is Mayan Indian. • Menchu, Guatemala's first Mayan presidential candidate, is one of 12 hopefuls in the running for the 9 September vote. • In an exclusive interview with The Associated Press, Menchu said Guatemala was ready for a change. • She said the country's ruling elite had 200 years to show what they could do for Guatemala, but now it was time for someone else to get that chance. • Menchu acknowledged the presidential race could get ugly, but said she would not respond to any racist or macho attacks, explaining that she felt no need to justify herself. • We come in peace, we come with a culture of tolerance, respect and friendship. We have come with a vision of inclusion, we will include everyone who is not corrupt or connected to drug trafficking with our project, said Menchu. • Polls have shown that while Menchu is well liked, she trails the top three candidates and has only an outside chance of winning. • Menchu, who received death threats during Guatemala's 36-year civil war said she no longer fears for her life, although two armed guards watch her house 24 hours a day. • Even if she loses, she said, the fact that she ran at all will be a success. • Now is the time to measure to what extent Guatemala is haunted by its own demons, which lead to racism, discrimination and exclusion, she said. • Menchu is running on promises to clean up entrenched corruption in Guatemala, as well as plans to review the new Central American Free Trade Agreement with the United States. She also wants to reform the country's military and police forces to make them more accountable and end widespread abuse. • Her campaign has raised questions again about her biography, I, Rigoberta Menchu, which propelled her into the role of international Indian activist and earned her the 1992 Nobel Prize. • The book was part of evidence Menchu submitted to a Spanish court case charging Guatemalan military officials with genocide during the country's 36 year civil war which killed more than 200-thousand people, mostly Indians before ending in 1996. • Rios Montt remains free in Guatemala. • • Find out more about AP Archive: http://www.aparchive.com/HowWeWork • Twitter: / ap_archive • Facebook: / aparchives • Instagram: / apnews • • • You can license this story through AP Archive: http://www.aparchive.com/metadata/you...

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