source: Cristosal
El Salvador’s security system hides behind its success statistics a pattern of torture, deaths in custody, and political persecution that has already reached 420 fatalities.
The widely promoted “Salvadoran security model.” rests on the premise that a permanent state of emergency—one that restricts rights and concentrates power—is necessary to protect the population from crime and violence. The Salvadoran government has repeatedly highlighted its results to argue that the end justifies the means. History shows that this formula has long been used to justify atrocities that ultimately produce social devastation and human harm that can take generations to repair.
In El Salvador, that cost is borne by tens of thousands of families living with the uncertainty of not knowing whether their detained relatives are still alive. It is also borne by those who have received their loved ones back in sealed coffins, bearing signs of physical abuse, malnutrition, and lack of medical care. The impact falls disproportionately on women: many have been forced to become caregivers and seekers of justice while their livelihoods deteriorate in the aftermath of arbitrary arrests and indefinite pretrial detention.
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This model distorts the state’s responsibility to protect citizens, operating under a logic similar to what is often described as the “enemy criminal law” doctrine in which certain individuals cease to be treated as subjects of rights. It is true that some members of criminal organizations have been detained, but thousands of ordinary citizens have also had their lives destroyed by what the state itself has described as “minimal collateral damage.”
The case of a young community volunteer illustrates this reality. She participated in educational programs for women, helped neighbors with disabilities, and collaborated with an association of families searching for people who had disappeared at the hands of gangs. She was arrested while pregnant. Her pregnancy involved complications and required specialized prenatal care; nonetheless, a judge ordered pretrial detention while her case proceeded, a practice that has become routine under the judiciary operating within the state of emergency.
She later obtained a court order for release on medical grounds, but prison authorities ignored the order. She gave birth in prison. Just over a month later, her baby was handed over to a family member in critical condition and died days later due to the lack of adequate medical care. None of this should have happened.
The prison system where these abuses occur has also been exported internationally. Last year, the United States government contracted the Salvadoran state to detain migrants at the Terrorism Confinement Center (CECOT). Many were transferred even against U.S. court orders and held without due process. A report by Cristosal and Human Rights Watch documented that several of these migrants were subjected to torture and sexual abuse during their detention. Subsequent investigations revealed that the majority had no prior links to gangs or violent crimes. These patterns mirror testimonies from other Salvadoran prisons and suggest that torture has become a systematic practice.
Last week, Cristosal also published a report documenting 245 cases of political persecution targeting political opponents, community leaders, journalists, environmental defenders, and human rights advocates. Among those detained is my colleague Ruth López, a renowned defender of transparency and head of Cristosal’s Anti-Corruption Unit. She was arrested nearly a year ago and for months had no regular access to her family or legal counsel. Her judicial process is being conducted in secrecy, as is the case for many proceedings under the state of emergency.
Meanwhile, the number of people detained under this regime has already surpassed 100,000. The combination of mass arrests, judicial persecution, and the absence of institutional oversight has created a climate of fear that has forced journalists, human rights defenders, and social leaders to leave the country.
Although the government argues that its policy is popular, popularity has never been a valid criterion for justifying massive human rights violations. Latin American history offers too many examples of this reality. Today in El Salvador, gang violence has been replaced by the violence of a system that operates without the limits of the rule of law.
For this reason, the creation of an independent international commission to investigate the possible commission of crimes against humanity—as highlighted in the recent report by the International Group of Experts for the Investigation of Human Rights Violations under the State of Emergency in El Salvador (GIPES)—is urgently needed. The violations continue: since the beginning of this year, 20 new deaths in state custody have been documented, bringing the total to at least 420 deaths.
The world deserves to know the truth about a security policy that is presented as a model of success, but which is built upon massive and systematic violations of human rights.
