The primary 2,000 inmates of a brand new jail in-built El Salvador to accommodate greater than 40,000 suspected gang members focused in President Nayib Bukele’s “battle” on crime have arrived on the facility.
Bukele tweeted on Friday: “At daybreak, in a single operation, we transferred the primary 2,000 members to the Heart for the Confinement of Terrorism (CECOT),” which he mentioned is the biggest jail within the Americas.
“This shall be their new dwelling, the place they’ll dwell for many years, all combined, unable to do any additional hurt to the inhabitants,” the president mentioned.
Human rights organizations mentioned the state of emergency Bukele has used to make the arrests has led to severe human rights violations. Amongst them are “mass arbitrary detention, torture and different types of ill-treatment towards detainees, deaths in custody, and abuse-ridden prosecutions”, Human Rights Watch mentioned in a press release.
Bukele posted a video exhibiting barefoot, tattooed males sporting solely white boxers, bent over with their arms behind their shaven heads. Every inmate sat along with his legs on both facet of the person in entrance of him as armed guards in balaclavas guarded the prisoners.
They have been loaded onto buses, arms and ft in shackles, to be taken to the brand new jail in a convoy that included helicopters.
On the new facility, the lads have been equally lined up earlier than being led in massive teams into their cells, the place they’re left sitting on the ground subsequent to stacked metallic beds. The warden advised journalists whereas unveiling the power that no mattresses can be supplied.
“We’re eliminating this most cancers from society,” Justice and Public Safety Minister Gustavo Villatoro mentioned on Twitter in regards to the inmates.
“Know that you’ll by no means stroll out of CECOT, you’ll pay for what you’re… cowardly terrorists,” he mentioned.
