El Salvador Police he said More than 1,400 people accused of involvement in the widespread gang violence over the weekend that led to Sunday’s declaration of a state of emergency were arrested in three days. According to the country’s government, 87 people were killed in various gang fights from Friday to Sunday, 62 of them on Saturday alone, the most violent day in El Salvador’s history since the civil war that ended in 1992.
El Salvador is considered one of the most violent countries in the world, particularly due to the activities of criminal gangs such as MS13 and Barrio18, which authorities say have around 70,000 members nationwide and are responsible for extortion. drug trafficking and hundreds of murders every year. The state of emergency provides, among other things, that those arrested can be held for 15 days without the right to legal assistance and that the police are free to check their phones.
El Salvador President Nayib Bukele spoke very harshly to gang members and shared some images and videos on social media of inmates being forced to run or walk in a jail, tied up and in their underwear; Bukele wrote that inmates’ meals were rationed and, in some cases, these people were even deprived of sleeping mattresses.
Bukele, who governs in a rather authoritarian manner, he criticized the international community and NGOs who have accused El Salvador of alleged human rights abuses in the treatment of detainees, saying that the rules envisaged by the state of emergency remain in place and that they “will no longer see the light of day”.
MENSAJE AT LAS PANDILLAS:
Tenemo’s 16,000 “homeboys” en nuestro poder.
Aparte de los 1,000 arrested en estos days.
Les decomisamos todo, hasta las colchonetas para dormir, les racionamos la comida y ahora ya no veran el sol.
PAREN DE MATAR YA or ellos la van a pagar también. pic.twitter.com/gpelYbhsQE
Nayib Bukele (@nayibbukele) March 28, 2022
Also read: The politician who took over El Salvador