In response to a gang escalation that left 87 dead in a weekend, on March 27, 2022 Bukele established an exception regime to combat gangs and? It has allowed thousands of arrests without court order.
Bukele proclaims that the security forces snatched the control they exerted over 80% of the territory and El Salvador became the country “safer of the western hemisphere”. Human Rights Groups claim that this was achieved At the expense of civil liberties.
“Without a doubt, the violence of the gangs and the homicide rate has decreased (…), but the Salvadorans do not have to choose between having security and Have guarantees to due process“, Says the deputy director for the Americas of Human Rights Watch, Juan Pappier.
In these three years they have been arrested more than 86 thousand alleged gang membersalthough some 8 thousand are already free after being declared innocent. However, human rights organizations ensure that there are still thousands of innocent after bars.
Homicides decreased dramatically in the countrythrough 106 per 100,000 inhabitants in 2015 to 1.9 in 2024.
Six crimes in March, but 8,000 innocents went to prison. El Salvador has been in exception for 3 years https://t.co/rlknobhiaf
– AP News (@ap_noticias) March 27, 2025