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Guatemala's Refugees

Vince Heptig

APF Fellow

1991

APF Fellow Vince Heptig lives in Guatemala City and has been photographing Guatemala’s refugees in Mexico and other locations. In addition to living in poverty, the new generation of refugee children has lost most cultural ties to its Mayan heritage.

© 1991 Vince Heptig
An almost toothless Gaslisia Cano, 89, waits for help at the re-education center outside of Nebaj.
A child is carried by her mother, waiting in line for donated food at a refugee camp, La Gloria, in Chiapas, Mexico.
Mateo Gomez in a sparse cornfield in a refugee camp in San Lorenzo, in Chiapas, Mexico. His son, also named Mateo, was born in the camp in 1985. They have little hope of returning to Guatemala.
A young refugee, Luis, sits atop a bag of donated corn in his family’s hut in the Cieneguita camp, Chiapas, Mexico.
An infant and her mother wait for food at the government’s re-education center outside of Nebaj, Guatemala.
Baltazar, age 11, leans on his hoe behind a group of civil patrollers outside of Nebaj, Guatemala.
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