The Congress of El Salvador approved a second expansion of the emergency regime

The decree was approved for a period of 30 days at the request of Nayib Bukele’s Council of Ministers with the votes of 67 deputies, of the 84 that make up the Parlament. The second extension of this legislation suspends the right of assembly, association, defense and inviolability of correspondence and telecommunications

Deputies of El Salvador during an extraordinary session of Congress

The Legislative Assembly of El Salvador, with a large pro-government majority, approved this Wednesday a second extension of an exceptional regime implemented since March 27 after a wave of murders attributed to gangs and that claimed the lives of 87 people.

The decree was approved at the request of President Nayib Bukele’s Council of Ministers with the votes of 67 deputies, of the 84 that make up Congress, for a period of 30 days, that is, extends until the end of next June.

The new expansion of the regime will enter into force as of its publication in the Official Gazette, according to the decree read in plenary session of Congress and which was not analyzed or discussed in parliament.

The second extension of this regime, which suspends the right of assembly, association, defense and inviolability of correspondence and telecommunications, occurs despite hundreds of complaints of human rights violations and warnings that the country is heading for a humanitarian crisis due to the saturation of prisons, where thousands of detainees have been transferred.

The Salvadoran Constitution states that the extension must not exceed a maximum period of 30 days and will only be extended if the causes that generated the declaration are maintained, but it does not limit the times in which it can be extended, according to the analysis presented by the Bukele Government. .

Abraham Ábrego, director of Strategic Litigation at the Cristosal humanitarian organization, recently pointed out that the Magna Carta does not fully establish whether the extension can be given only once, so it is subject to interpretation.

< p class=”paragraph”>Deputies from the ruling party Nuevas Ideas (NI) pointed out that although the wave of violence that led to the implementation of the state of exception has been controlled, the “genesis” of the gangs “has not ended”, therefore, it is necessary for the regime to continue so that “the Government completely ends the gangs.”

Furthermore, they pointed out that during the regime “there has been no violation of rights”, but rather “justice for the families, victims of the gangs”.

The President of El Salvador, Nayib Bukele

Only the non-governmental organization Cristosal has received more than 700 complaints of human rights violations during the emergency regime, mainly due to arbitrary arrests.

Mass arrests have been the main commitment of the Executive of Bukele during the state of exception, but so far it is still unknown if the Government is working on a plan that proposes measures for an in-depth solution to said phenomenon.

David Morales, former human rights attorney, recently warned that under the massive arrests of alleged gang members, the authorities have also arrested people “who are not gang members and are subjected to serious suffering and state violence.”

Half of the Salvadoran population approves of an expansion of the regime, but considers that the Government should take “other types of different measures” to confront the phenomenon of violence, according to a survey presented this Wednesday.

According to police authorities, more than 34,500 alleged gang members have been detained under the emergency regime.

Parliamentarian Claudia Ortiz, from the opposition party Vamos, pointed out that under the exceptional regime “the rights of innocent people are being violated” and that “there are people dying at the hands of the State.”

Furthermore, he asked the government to explain “why they cannot buy beat crime without an exception regime.”

(With information from EFE)