| Iris Yassmin Barrios Aguilar | |
| Office: | President of one of Guatemala’s two High Risk Court Tribunals |
Iris Yassmin Barrios Aguilar is a judge and the president of one of Guatemala’s two High Risk Court Tribunals.[1] She was the presiding judge in the case of Efraín Ríos Montt, a former dictator of Guatemala.[1] In that trial Montt was found guilty of the genocide of indigenous Ixil Mayans; the verdict came in 2013.[2] The trial was the first time a national judiciary tried a former head of state for genocide in his home country.[1] However, on May 20, 2013, the Constitutional Court of Guatemala overturned the conviction, voiding all proceedings back to April 19 and ordering that the trial be "reset" to that point, pending a dispute over the recusal of judges. Officials have said that Ríos Montt's trial will resume in January 2015.[3]
Barrios received a 2014 International Women of Courage award.[4] [5]
As of April 2014 her judicial authority was suspended for a year due to a complaint against her by a lawyer who was involved in the trial of the President and war criminal Efraín Ríos Montt.[6]
She was one of three judges, together with Gloria Porras and Erika Aifan, who have received support from the Inter-American Court on Human Rights. That court has ordered that these three should be given special protection. Aifan would also receive an International Women of Courage award in 2021.[7]