Days after suspected gang members killed 10 Guatemalan police officers, police and soldiers took their new powers granted under a state of emergency to the Barrio 18 gang’s center of operations in the north of the capital.
Dozens of police officers and soldiers, some carrying rifles and wearing bullet-proof vests or with their faces covered, patrolled the narrow warren of streets in the cluster of neighborhoods called Zone 18 on Tuesday. At a checkpoint, they asked for identification of passing motorists and told some to stand against a wall to be patted down for weapons.
