MEXICO CITY -- Guatemala’s highest court late Monday overturned the genocide conviction of former military dictator Efrain Rios Montt, a verdict that had been hailed by human rights organizations but now hangs in limbo. 
 
 The Constitutional Court said the landmark trial of Rios Montt should have been halted and rewound to an earlier date because of a jurisdictional dispute, Guatemala’s Prensa Libre reported on its website. The ruling suggested that Rios Montt would be retried or that parts of the trial, which contained graphic and chilling testimony from victims, would be redone. 
 
 A three-judge panel convicted Rios Montt, 86, on May 10 of genocide in the slaughter of more than 1,700 Ixil Maya in the early 1980s, some of the bloodiest years of Guatemala’s long civil war and the period during which he served as de facto president of the country. 
 
 Rios Montt was sentenced to 80 years in prison, but that sentence was vacated in the Monday ruling. The conviction had represented a rare prosecution of a former leader on human rights atrocities by a court of his own nation. 
 
 
 
 ALSO: ||||| Image copyright AP Image caption Gen Rios Montt has denied ordering any attacks against any of Guatemala's indigenous groups 
 
 Guatemala's top court has thrown out the conviction for genocide and crimes against humanity of former military leader Efrain Rios Montt. 
 
 The constitutional court ruled that the trial should restart from the point where it stood on 19 April. 
 
 On 10 May, Gen Rios Montt was convicted of ordering the deaths of 1,771 people of the Ixil Maya ethnic group during his time in office in 1982-83. 
 
 The 86-year-old was sentenced to 80 years in prison. He denies the charges. 
 
 'Illegal proceedings' 
 
 Monday's ruling throws into disarray the historic trial of Gen Rios Montt, the first former head of state to face genocide charges in a court within his own country. 
 
 Analysis In essence, the court's decision does two important things. First, it overturns the sentence of genocide against Efrain Rios Montt, at least for the time being. And secondly, it resets the legal proceedings to the point where they stood on 19 April. On that day, the court ruled, Mr Rios Montt was temporarily left without a legal defence as his lawyer was briefly expelled from the courtroom after he accused the presiding judge of bias against him. Those few hours in which Mr Rios Montt was without legal representation at his side have set back the case by over a month. All the testimonies and witness statements heard from that point onwards will have to be delivered again as will the concluding statements from both sides. Rios Montt trial: Fight goes on 
 
 The three-to-two ruling by a panel of constitutional judges annuls everything that has happened in the trial since 19 April, when Gen Rios Montt was briefly left without a defence lawyer. 
 
 The defence team had walked out of the court on the previous day in protest at what they called "illegal proceedings". 
 
 The court ordered that he be represented by a public defence lawyer, which Gen Rios Montt rejected. 
 
 The general instead insisted on being represented by lawyer Francisco Garcia, who had been expelled earlier on in the proceedings for trying to have the judges dismissed "for bias". 
 
 Mr Garcia was again expelled on 19 April as he accused the presiding judge of failing to hear his legal challenges. 
 
 Monday's ruling said the trial should have been halted at this point while the challenges filed by Mr Garcia were being resolved. 
 
 According to the constitutional court ruling, the guilty verdict and the 80-year sentence handed down by Judge Jazmin Barrios on 10 May are therefore now void. 
 
 Human rights group Amnesty International said it was a "devastating blow for the victims of the serious human rights violations committed during the conflict". 
 
 Harrowing testimony 
 
 The constitutional court said that statements delivered in court before 19 April would stand, but that closing arguments would have to be given again. 
 
 During the hearings, dozens of victims gave harrowing testimony about atrocities committed by soldiers. 
 
 An estimated 200,000 people were killed in Guatemala's 1960-1996 civil war, the vast majority of them indigenous Mayans. 
 
 Gen Rios Montt's 17 months in power are believed to have been one of the most violent periods of the war. 
 
 The BBC's Will Grant in Guatemala City says Monday's low-key press conference contrasted sharply with the day the verdict was announced, when indigenous campaigners and relatives of victims hugged and cried with relief in the packed courtroom. 
 
 But he adds that the decision to annul the sentence does not signal the end of the legal battle, as both sides will now start preparing to return to court to replay the final weeks of the trial. 
 
 The general's lawyer said he would now demand his release from the military hospital where he was taken from prison after allegedly fainting.
– Guatemala's highest court has chucked out the historic genocide conviction of former dictator Efrain Rios Montt. The court overturned the conviction—which brought an 80-year sentence for the 86-year-old former military strongman—and ordered for his trial to be rewound to April 19, when there was a dispute between two judges, the BBC reports. Montt, the first former leader to be found guilty of genocide by a tribunal in his own country, was found guilty of ordering the deaths of 1,700 Ixil Maya in the early 1980s, but weeks of his trial, including harrowing testimony from survivors, will now have to be redone, the Los Angeles Times reports. Montt, who maintains his innocence, is now expected to leave the military hospital where he is being held to return home under house arrest.