Today the New York Times remembers the horrific fire at Guatemala’s state-run group home, known as the Virgin de Asuncion Hogar Seguro, in “A Locked Door, a Fire, and 41 Girls Killed as Police Stood By.” (Ironically, the word “Seguro” translates as “safe.”) Fifty-six girls were locked in a room when fire broke out. Forty-one girls died while police stood outside the door for nine long minutes and failed to unlock it.

Trials have begun for officials held accountable. Can justice really be served? The girls are dead. It’s doubtful anything will change.

Here is the excerpt that will haunt me:

The deaths are a reflection of the cruel passage to adulthood for many young girls in Guatemala, a journey often marked by poverty, violence and desperation. The nation has one of the highest child pregnancy rates, and the homicide rate for women is among the worst in the world.

“To be a girl in Guatemala is a risk, it’s been this way for generations,” said Marwin Bautista, an under secretary in the Ministry of Social Welfare who oversees the group homes.

I posted previously about the fire, here, here, here, and here.

“Tragic” can’t begin to describe the fire and, undoubtedly, the reality of the girls’ lives before the fire. Sadness, outrage, despair. No word suffices.

Photo credit: NY Times, Daniele Volpe

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