Guatemala just announced on Friday that it’s now officially designating Hezbollah and all its affiliates as a terrorist organization.
That decision was expected ever since Guatemalan president Alejandro Giammattei reaffirmed his government’s commitment, back in May, to ban Hezbollah after declaring it a terrorist group.
“We have declared Hezbollah to be a terrorist group, but we need more than this designation to be applied to this organization,” he had said, stressing that the ban still requires “a regulatory framework” to prevent the financing of terrorism through his country.
With the framework now in place, after the recent passing of the bill, Guatemala becomes the 8th country this year, including Honduras and Columbia to designate Hezbollah a terrorist group,
The announcement came a day after Estonia announced sanctions on Hezbollah, aligning with 6 other European countries that have already designated the Lebanese Shiite-movement group as a terrorist organization.
These countries are Germany, The United Kingdom, The Netherlands, Serbia, Lithuania, and Latvia, adding to Switzerland considering to take the same decision.
Another country that is also set to take a stand against Hezbollah is one of its previous staunch allies up until 2016: Sudan.
The African country has committed to designating Hezbollah as part of its US-brokered agreement to normalize relations with Israel.
