Hundreds of immigrants, alleged by US authorities to be members of Venezuela’s notorious Tren de Aragua gang, were transferred to the Terrorism Confinement Center (CECOT) on Sunday 16 March.
A deal was recently struck between Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Salvadoran President, Nayib Bukele, which will see the country in Central America provide the US with a year’s worth of detention services in exchange for $6 million (£4.6 million).
The President has already made it clear that he and his country are happy to incarcerate anyone who is deported from the United States.
Inside the El Salvador prison (CNN/YouTube)
On X, the President said: “Thank you to El Salvador, and in particular President Bukele, for your understanding of this horrible situation, which was allowed to happen to the United States because of Democrat leadership.
“We will not forget.”
El Salvador was once a country torn apart by gang wars and criminal activity, but crime has been significantly reduced since Bukele’s rise to power in 2019. The President declared a state of emergency, which, while controversial at the time, has seen police deployed in neighbourhoods across the country, while many former gang leaders and members now sit behind bars.
And there is little chance of escape, judging by a CNN report which shows journalist David Culver visiting the inside of the high-security prison located in Tecoluca, around two hours from the country’s capital, San Salvador.
You can forget about having your own personal space in this prison, as inmates are stuffed into group cells with as many as 80 other men, and are only let out for 30 minutes of exercise each day. Once you arrive in CECOT, it is unlikely that you leave, with legal and medical visits all done within the facility.
Although Culver’s report suggests that around 7,000 people have been wrongly imprisoned in these horrific conditions, Bukele’s government sees this as ‘collateral damage’.
