The plan to fight the gangs of the Salvadoran Government of Nayib Bukele encounters a new setback from abroad. The Spanish National Court refuses to hand over a gang member, Mario Alberto RS, to the Central American State due to the “great risks” that his fundamental rights will be violated if he is imprisoned there. In a forceful 38-page resolution, dated April 22, the court rules out extradition after reviewing the current sociopolitical context that the country is going through, which has maintained the declaration of a state of emergency for more than two years: “There is evidence about the concrete and real exposure of the defendant to inhuman or degrading treatment in the event that his surrender is agreed to,” the magistrates emphasize in their ruling.
The position of the National Court, which has already ruled out the surrender of another alleged gang member in October 2022 (a few months after the state of emergency was declared in El Salvador), affects the “continuous and serious situations of violation of human rights” that occur in the prisons of that country, where the Bukele regime imposed a heavy hand to neutralize the advance of the gangs. The Executive’s plan, which has involved the mass arrest of more than 70,000 people, has been developed amidst a multitude of accusations of “serious violations of human rights”: extreme overcrowding, arbitrary detentions (including minors), detention without any type of guarantees, total isolation, virtual trials without the intervention of witnesses, opaque prosecutions… This same week, social organizations announced that they have accredited 327 forced disappearances.
“Unfortunately, the situation of violation of Human Rights persists […] When the current two years of the state of emergency had not yet elapsed, we already declared the inadmissibility of the extradition of [otro] claimed for humanitarian reasons, related to the serious danger that, for the life and physical integrity of the person claimed, his surrender would entail, given the current situation [de El Salvador]”, justify the three judges of the National Court who have issued this new resolution – judges Teresa Palacios, Juan Francisco Martel and Fermín Javier Echarri -. The order of April 22 adds: “In the prisons of said country there are continuous and serious situations of violation of human rights, which cannot be controlled by the Government. The violations of human rights have been denounced by international organizations, and have been aggravated by the declared state of emergency, where constitutional guarantees are left in the background.”
El Salvador demands Mario Alberto RS to serve a sentence of three years and four months in prison for collaborating with the Dieciocho Revolucionarios gang. According to the documentation sent by the Central American State, this 44-year-old man was in charge of surveillance tasks during the gang meetings, to “notify if the Police arrived in the area.” However, the accused assures that he moved with his family to Spain, precisely, to escape “from the actions of the members of that gang, being the object of their constant and repeated extortion.”
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When resolving this extradition, the judges of the National Court have assessed the decisions of different international organizations. The court has taken into account the various pronouncements of the IACHR (Inter-American Commission on Human Rights), an entity that promotes the observance of human rights in the region and acts as a consultative body of the Organization of American States (OAS), which urge El Salvador to ensure that actions to prevent and punish crimes and delinquency are implemented within the limits and procedures that guarantee respect for rights and human dignity.
The order also includes the Amnesty International statement of April 2023 that denounced the commission of “serious human rights violations in a systematic manner” since the emergency regime was approved in El Salvador, as well as journalistic articles that reveal the “situation of bankruptcy of human rights” that that country suffers.
The magistrates also highlight that Mario Alberto RS’s claim is directly linked to the tough policy that Bukele implemented against the gangs. “Therefore, given the plausible hypothesis, in view of the existing political-social situation in the Republic of El Salvador and the personal circumstances of the person claimed, that his fundamental rights are not respected, we consider that the delivery should be rejected. , since proceeding otherwise would imply protecting possible situations of serious risk to his life and physical integrity,” the judges conclude.
The National Court thus marks, with the support of the Prosecutor’s Office, a clear line in its current cooperation policy with El Salvador, with which Spain maintains a bilateral extradition treaty signed in 1997. In recent weeks, the security forces have detained in Spain two other alleged gang members from the Central American country, who could benefit from this court policy.
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