Salvadoran environmental defenders detained for decades-old crimes
Source: The Guardian
Salvadoran environmental defenders detained for decades-old crimes
Activists worry the arrests are a move by the cash-strapped government to open the country to now banned metals mining
Nina Lakhani in Mexico City
@ninalakhani
Sat 14 Jan 2023 11.00 GMT
Five prominent environmental defenders who played a crucial role in securing a historic mining ban in El Salvador have been detained accused of civil war era and gang-related crimes, in what rights groups fear is a ruse to restart mining.
Miguel Ángel Gámez, Alejandro Laínez García, Pedro Antonio Rivas Laínez, Antonio Pacheco and Saúl Agustín Rivas Ortega were detained on Wednesday in Cabañas in northern El Salvador, accused of killing an alleged army informant more than 33 years ago during the brutal civil war that claimed 75,000 lives.
Nayib Bukele, the authoritarian populist president who swept to power in 2019, has repeatedly blocked attempts to seek justice for civil war victims – the vast majority of whom were civilians killed by the US-backed dictatorship and rightwing death squads.
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In a statement, the Washington-based Institute for Policy Studies (IPS) said the government’s decision to arrest the five men while blocking justice in high-profile cases like the El Mozote massacre “raises questions about whether the true motivation is to attempt to silence these water defenders”.
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Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/jan/14/el-salvador-environmental-defenders-arrested-mining-ban
