The first and major battles involved the Kʼicheʼ people who were defeated in March 1524 and resulted in the capture of the K'iche' capital of Qʼumarkaj.

[1] In 1525, Spanish conquistador of the Aztec Empire, Hernán Cortés arrived to Petén to subdue the rebellious Cristóbal de Olid who had been sent to conquer Honduras.

Guatemala declared its own independence from Spain on 15 September 1821 and chose to join the Mexican Empire under Emperor Agustín de Iturbide.

[5] In 1960, Guatemala entered into a civil war between the government and various leftist rebel groups supported chiefly by ethnic Maya indigenous people and Ladino peasants.

At the time the protesters entered, the Spanish Ambassador, Máximo Cajal López was meeting with former Guatemalan Vice-President Eduardo Rafael Cáceres Lehnhoff at the embassy.

Guatemalan President Fernando Romeo Lucas García and police and government officials immediately met at the National Palace and decided to remove the protesters by force from the embassy.

Just before noon that same day, 300 armed state agents surrounded the building and cut the electricity, water and telephone lines.

As the fire blazed, the police refused to allow volunteers and firefighters to enter the building to save those trapped on the second floor.

[10] In 1999, Rigoberta Menchú presented charges for torture, genocide, illegal detention and state-sponsored terrorism against former President Ríos Montt and four other retired Guatemalan generals, two of them ex-presidents in Spain as Spain's Constitutional Court ruled in 2005 that Spanish courts can try those accused of crimes against humanity even if the victims were not of Spanish origin.

[4] Guatemala's main exports to Spain include: tuna, shrimp, zinc, sugar, rum and coffee.

Spain's main exports to Guatemala include: machinery, medicine, food products, electrical equipment and steel.