El Salvador: News & Updates

They said they were punished in a dark room called the island, where they were trampled, kicked and forced to kneel for hours.

One man said officers thrust his head into a tank of water to simulate drowning. 

Another said he was forced to perform oral sex on guards wearing hoods.

Others were shot by rubber bullets.

They said they were told by officials that they would die in the Salvadoran prison, that the world had forgotten them.

“‘You are all terrorists,’” Edwin Meléndez, 30, recalled being told by officers who added: “‘Terrorists must be treated like this.’”

When they could no longer take it, they held a hunger strike. They cut themselves, writing protest messages on sheets in blood.

One detainee, age 26, was so sick that he could not get out of bed, and other men had to feed him. Taken to the infirmary, he was beaten in front of medical personnel. A doctor told him:  “‘Resign yourself. It’s time for you to die.’”

To send the 252 Venezuelan men to prison in El Salvador —along with many Salvadoran nationals—in March of this year, Mr. Trump invoked the Alien Enemies Act, a sweeping, rarely used 18th-century law that allows for the expulsion of people from an invading nation.

In September, Mr. Trump, speaking at the United Nations General Assembly,  praised Salvadoran officials for “the successful and professional job they’ve done in receiving and jailing so many criminals that entered our country.”

After President Bukele’s government repealed El Salvador’s historic mining ban, environmentalists fear a quiet return of metal mining—starting with the long-contested El Dorado gold project. Despite official silence, new companies are being registered, land deals linked to mining firms are surfacing, and military presence in affected communities is increasing. Activists report being watched and harassed, even as they continue to fight criminal charges seen as politically motivated. With worsening water shortages and contamination risks, many Salvadorans warn that reopening the mines threatens not only the environment but also their communities’ survival and democratic freedoms.

Late in Trump’s first term, the Justice Department convened the Joint Task Force Vulcan to catch senior members of the notorious MS-13 gang who, from their base in El Salvador,  were directing the organization’s activities in the US (including kidnappings, drug trafficking and murders). Eventually, nine MS-13 gang leaders were taken into US federal custody.

But now President Bukele of El Salvador wants them back.

Why?

The gang leaders have threatened to exposed Bukele’s alleged deals his government made with MS-13 to help achieve El Salvador’s historic drop in violence. It’s also a key step in hindering an ongoing U.S. investigation into his government’s relationship with MS-13.

Early this year, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio brokered a deal to make both Trump and Bukele look good. Trump needed a foreign partner to accept deportees regardless of nationality or legal considerations. Bukele, condemned by human rights advocates for curtailment of civil liberties, sweeping accumulation of executive power and oversight of a prison system beset by abuse, needed to ward off threats to his reputation as a crime-fighting visionary (and “the world’s coolest dictator,” as he describes himself).

The deal between Rubio and Bukele granted the Trump administration access to a sprawling foreign prison dubbed the Terrorism Confinement Center, or CECOT, that would become integral to Trump’s ongoing efforts to conduct the “largest deportation in American history.”

Read this compelling article based on accounts from dozens of officials from the United States and El Salvador, lawyers representing MS-13 gang members, prosecutors, diplomats, former Justice Department officials and political appointees. The Trump administration’s willingness to renege on secret arrangements made with informants who had aided U.S. investigations has not been previously reported.

Political imprisonment is surging in El Salvador under President Bukele, targeting lawyers, journalists, and activists who dare to speak out. Once a symbol of post-war democracy, the country now uses modern authoritarian tactics—forced disappearances, fake charges, and harsh prison conditions—to silence dissent. The case of Ruth López is just one of many. As fear spreads and critics flee, the world must decide how to respond.

Political imprisonment is once again haunting Latin America, with El Salvador emerging as a stark new example under President Nayib Bukele. Once praised for modernizing the country, Bukele has instead refined the authoritarian tactics of the past—using mass arrests, smear campaigns, and the state of exception to silence dissent. Lawyers, journalists, and community leaders who dare to criticize the government now face fabricated charges and indefinite detention. Among them is Ruth López, the renowned anti-corruption lawyer declared a prisoner of conscience after her disappearance and arrest in May 2025.

Behind each detention lies a message: in Bukele’s El Salvador, speaking out has a price. Reports reveal over 430 deaths in custody, families left without answers, and a justice system stripped of independence. As fear drives activists into exile and civic space collapses, international voices warn that the country’s democratic facade is crumbling. Calls are growing for global pressure—from the OAS to the United States—to demand accountability and the release of political prisoners before the last remnants of Salvadoran democracy vanish entirely.

In El Salvador, defending human rights is becoming a criminal act. Members of the NGO UNIDEHC—lawyers, advocates, and community leaders—are facing raids, arrests, and even Interpol notices for standing up to forced evictions and state abuses. Human rights defender Fidel Zavala now faces three criminal cases and was returned to the very prison where he had denounced torture and death. This isn’t just repression—it’s retaliation, and it sends a chilling message to anyone who dares to speak out.

Since 2022, El Salvador’s state of exception has led to mass detentions and severe overcrowding in prisons. In this context, corruption has become systemic: families of detainees are forced to provide “donations” — including money, medicine, food, and supplies — in exchange for visits or information about their loved ones. Cases documented by Cristosal reveal that these practices are widespread, coercive, and institutionalized, turning basic human rights into commodities. The hidden business of the prison system exploits the desperation of families, perpetuates abuse, and erodes the rule of law.

Cristosal full length report: here

Venezuelan men freed from an El Salvador prison share shocking stories of abuse they suffered while being held there. After months in captivity, they describe beatings, torture, and sexual assault in terrible conditions. Their testimonies shed light on the brutal treatment they faced at the hands of Salvadoran guards, with U.S. involvement raising urgent questions about responsibility and accountability. 

8. August 2025

In El Salvador, land once turned into homes by the poor is now being claimed by private companies — with the government’s backing. In the Primero de Diciembre community, families face eviction from land they’ve lived on for 20 years after a company, Quebec S.A., suddenly asserted ownership. Residents say this is part of a broader pattern under President Bukele’s development agenda, where land privatization and forced displacement are accelerating. Activists warn that the government’s state of exception is being used not just against gangs, but to silence opposition and clear the way for tourism and real estate projects — threatening the rights and livelihoods of El Salvador’s most vulnerable.