Guatemala
Carlos Antonio Carias waits in the Supreme Court in Guatemala City, August 2, 2011. Guatemala on Tuesday sentenced four soldiers, including Carias, to 6,060 years of prison each, in the first conviction for a massacre during the country's brutal 36-year civil war. More than 200 people were killed when Guatemalan soldiers attacked the northern village of Las Dos Erres in 1982 at the height of Guatemala's civil war. Reuters

Four ex-soldiers in Guatemala were sentenced to 6,000 years in prison a piece for their involvement in a bloody massacre during the country's civil war.

Described as a "historic sentence" by state-run news agency AGN, the trial is the first related to Guatemala's dictatorship-era.

Carlos Antonio Carias Lopez, Reyes Collin Guali, Daniel Martinez Mendez and Manuel Pop Sun plead not guilty to crimes against humanity.

"I have said several times that I am innocent ... There is no solid proof," Carias told CNN affiliate Noti7 before the ruling.

Nonetheless, all four were convicted on Tuesday for their involvement in the 1982 massacre at the village of Dos Erres, where almost 250 people were killed. Eyewitnesses testified before the court about what they saw during the event. One woman said that she paid Carias ransom money for her missing family members, but they were never returned.

In December 1982, an elite Guatemalan Army unit known as the Kaibiles were ordered to enter Dos Erres to kill guerrillas and guerrilla sympathizers. The Kaibiles found no evidence of guerrilla fighters in the town, but rounded up villagers, including women and children, and killed them with gunshots, hammers and other tools. All four convicted men were officers in the army.

The soldiers were given 30-year terms for each of the 201 people they were accused of killing.

In July, the United States deported former soldier Pedro Pimentel Rios back to Guatemala. He will be tried for his role in the massacre at a later date.

The civil war in Guatemala lasted 36 years, during which there were 699 massacres, according to the United Nations. Around 200,000 people died in the war between 1960-1996.