In El Salvador, a well-known human rights lawyer who fights to have immigrants deported as a result of President Donald Trump’s strict anti-immigration policies has been arrested.
Ruth Eleonora López, 47, a senior member of the human rights organization Cristosal and vocal critic of Trump’s ally Nayib Bukele, president, was taken into custody late on Sunday.
The attorney general of El Salvador confirmed the arrest after an online post in which it claimed López had allegedly lied about defrauding state funds while working for the country’s electoral court ten years ago.
According to a statement from Cristosal, neither her family nor her legal team have been able to discover where she is. The refusal to give her information or grant lawyers’ access is “a flagrant violation of due process.”
The group said her arrest “proves serious doubts about the growing dangers that human rights defenders in El Salvador face.”
López has openly criticised the government’s widespread detention of alleged gang members, many of whom have not been charged.
More than 250 Venezuelan immigrants who have been deported to El Salvador under Trump’s administration have been helped by Cristosal, one of the most prominent human rights organizations in Latin America.
Bukele, who has cultivated close ties with Trump and called himself “the world’s coolest dictator,” claimed El Salvador is ready to house US prisoners in a sprawling mega-prison that was inaugurated last year.
Trump allegedly had ties to the Tren de Aragua gang, which their families and attorneys contend he did in March by using hardly ever invoked wartime powers to send dozens of Venezuelans to El Salvador without trial.
Under the Alien Enemies Act of 1798, the US Supreme Court on Friday forbade the Trump administration from resuming its immediate deportations of Venezuelans.
As part of what observers perceive as a wider campaign of harassment and intimidation against civil society organizations and independent media, police entered its offices during a press conference in April to film and photograph journalists and staff members.
For her dedication to the rule of law and the rule of law, López was named one of the top 100 women in the world by the BBC as one of the 100 most powerful and inspirational women.
She was required to be released right away in a joint statement signed by more than a dozen human rights organizations, including Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch.
The statement stated that “El Salvador’s state of exception has been used to silence critical voices as well as to address gang-related violence.”
Source: Aljazeera
Leave a Reply