The protest in Guatemala City coincided with the commemoration of the moment Columbus first saw land in his search for an alternative route to India and thus discovered the American continent. According to tradition, this happened on October 12, 1492.
The demonstrators believe that the annual commemoration of that moment does not pay enough attention to the downside of the arrival of Europeans to Central America, among other places. Indigenous inhabitants were enslaved, exploited or died from the diseases brought by the colonizers.
The protesters also pulled the head off a statue of former President Jose Maria Reina Barrios, who led the country from 1892 to 1898.
They also smeared that statue with red paint:
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