El Salvador: News & Updates

On Sunday, March 27, just hours after congress approved a state of emergency, heavily armed police and soldiers entered the packed, gang-controlled neighborhood of San Jose El Pino. Freed from having to explain an arrest or grant access to a lawyer, they went door to door, dragging out young men. President Nayib Bukele has responded to the surge in gang killings with mass arrests in poor neighborhoods like San Jose El Pino, each day posting the growing arrest total and photos of tattooed men. The highly publicized roundups are not the result of police investigations into the murders in late March, but propel a tough-on-crime narrative that critics are calling “punitive populism.”

A three-day weekend of extreme gang violence in El Salvador, March 25 to March 27, ended with 87 people dead. The government of President Nayib Bukele responded by declaring a state of emergency on March 27, suspending various civil liberties for 30 days and expanding the armed forces’ enforcement powers. Civil liberties suspended by the emergency declaration include freedom of association, the right to legal counsel in case of detention and the right to remain silent if arrested. The emergency declaration allows the government to arrest citizens for 15 days without charging them, listen to private communications without a warrant and detain anyone suspected of belonging to a gang. The government also announced new restrictions in prisons that included limiting meals to two per day, locking inmates in their cells 24/7 and removing sleeping mats as a type of collective punishment.

Some National Civilian Police commanders in El Salvador have been pressuring their officers to meet daily arrest quotas as part of the government’s crackdown on street gangs that have yielded more than 10,000 arrests, a police union said Tuesday. On March 26, authorities reported 62 killings across El Salvador that they attributed to the country’s powerful street gangs. President Nayib Bukele requested and received from congress a state of emergency that allows police to make arrests without explaining the reason, not provide access to a lawyer and hold suspects for 15 days without charge. The congress has since passed additional measures, including increasing prison sentences.

For the second time in three years, El Salvador is back under martial law. The state of exception was approved so swiftly that lawmakers failed to remove references to public health and economic reopening in the text, clearly copied and pasted from the decrees that governed the country’s notoriously militarized 2020 pandemic lockdown. This latest suspension of constitutional guarantees, however, was enacted as part of right-wing populist president Nayib Bukele’s newly declared “war on gangs.” Still reeling from the pandemic, working-class Salvadorans now find themselves caught between predatory street gangs and an unaccountable authoritarian state.

You’ve probably seen the terrifying headlines about the suspension of constitutional rights in El Salvador, the mass roundups of over 6,000 people now being held without charges and with no right to defense, President Bukele’s threats to deny prisoners food and other basic rights, and his accusations that any critic is a gang sympathizer. We at CISPES wanted to share a new round-up we put together of analysis from social movement organizations, human rights leaders, and journalists in El Salvador who are courageously speaking out against state repression and threats to democracy.

El Salvador has seen a tragic return to some of the country’s most violent years. At least 80 people were killed on the weekend of March 26-27, and in response, President Nayib Bukele quickly summoned the Legislative Assembly, which in the early hours following the killing spree declared a state of emergency for 30 days. The move effectively suspended some human rights, such as the right to a defense, knowing the charges against you, the right not to incriminate yourself and having access to a lawyer. The decree also suspended the right to freedom of assembly and association and allows the government to intercept private communications without a court order. Discrediting the opinions of human rights activists who have been working to promote and protect human rights in El Salvador for decades is little more than a cheap tactic designed to distract from the policies that, by action or omission, are impeding the country from tackling the wave of violence that is destroying so many lives. Strengthening the judiciary, particularly the special prosecutors in charge of investigating complex crimes by allocating sufficient resources and personnel so they can carry out their work effectively and independently, for example, is one of the policies the country should put in place to break up the gangs.

Men, women and children have been rounded up across the Central American country since the government declared a state of emergency on 27 March, suspending constitutional rights including the presumption of innocence. President Nayib Bukele has said that the detainees are all gang members and that they will not be released. While the police claim to have captured the MS-13 leaders who ordered the killings, there is mounting evidence that ordinary people who live or work in gang-dominated neighbourhoods have been arrested arbitrarily.

This past weekend was one of the most violent in El Salvador. At least 80 people were killed in different parts of the country, allegedly by gang members. We at WOLA condemn this situation, and stand in solidarity with the families of victims, local communities, and with the entire population that suffers because of these crimes. We reaffirm their right to live in peace and without violence.

The Salvadoran congress approved legal reforms of immediate application that increase prison sentences against those who participate or lead gangs. As a result of these changes, belonging to a gang will be judged as a crime of illicit association and will carry prison sentences that may range from 20 to 30 years. The legislators established sentences of between 40 and 45 years in prison for those who create, organize, lead or finance gangs.