At the request of the President, Nayib Bukele, the deputies voted for an extension of one month of this exceptional regime, which allows arrests without mandate.
MO12345lemonde With AFP
The Salvador Legislative Assembly has extended the state of emergency by one month on Tuesday, February 14. The deputies thus responded to the request of the president, Nayib Bukele, whose “war” against the violent gangs has already led to more than 64,000 arrests.
This extension, approved by 67 of the 84 deputies of the Monocameral Congress, is the eleventh since the entry into force of this exceptional regime, in March 2022.
“The country has already changed, we are not going to take a step back, and it is thanks to the conclusive results that we have [obtained] in the streets,” said the president of the legislative assembly, Ernesto Castro. “We are going to get rid of all gang members,” he said.
According to official figures, this “war” against violent gangs has already led to 64,111 arrests. The Minister of Justice and Security, Gustavo Villatoro, said, however, that on the total number of detainees under the emergency regime, 3,745 people had been “released”, for lack of charges.
Critics of human rights associations
The state of emergency, which raised criticism from human rights organizations, allows arrests without a mandate. It was established last year, at the end of March, after a wave of 87 assassinations attributed to the slumps, gangs which spread terror in Salvador and in neighboring countries.
Recently, the government inaugurated a gigantic penitentiary in the south-east of the country, near the city of Tecoluca, where 40,000 alleged members of these gangs will be detained.
President Bukele claimed Tuesday on Twitter that since his coming to power, in 2019, there had been “three hundred days without homicide”. The government attributes this result to the “effectiveness” of its security plan and the emergency regime.