Guatemala’s murder statistics suggest that the country is on course to see only a slight rise in its homicide rate this year, despite reports of a significant increase in violence, reports Central American Politics.
The blog points out that, according to the Guatemalan National Civilian Police, 5,192 murders were committed from January through the end of November this year; an average of 472 murders per month. If this trend continues in December, the country will end the year with a total of 5,664 murders, notes the blog.
This would represent an approximate murder rate of close to 42 murders per 100,000, in the country which has a population of around 13.3 million. This would be only marginally higher that the murder rate recorded in 2010, which stood at 41 per 100,000, according to the U.S. State Department.
This figure is well below the per capita murder rates set to end the year in the other two “Northern Triangle” countries, El Salvador (72) and Honduras (86).
Homicide rates do, however, vary greatly across different regions of Guatemala. The Peten region, the country’s most violent, has a murder rate of between 80 to 90 homicides per 100,000, according to World Bank figures.
See Central American Politic’s graph of Guatemalan murder rates, below: