Following a sudden spate of killings, El Salvador has declared a state of emergency.
This has seen 17,000 people arrested and a raft of tough new measures to
tackle the long-standing problem of gang violence.
All this marks a worrying setback for a country
that was leaving behind its reputation as the world's murder capital.
However, it also raises serious questions
about the direction being taken by the country's charismatic young president.
Hello and welcome. If you're new to the channel, my name is James Ker-Lindsay and
here I take an informed look at international relations, conflicts, security and statehood.
If you were asked to name the most dangerous countries in the world, there's a good chance
that you'd immediately think of a war zone: such as Ukraine, Yemen, or Ethiopia.
But this isn't always the case.
In fact, many of the world's deadliest countries are instead
blighted by organised crime and gang violence.
One of the best examples is El Salvador.
In 2015, it had the second highest violent death rate in the world.
At 126 deaths per 100,000 inhabitants, only Syria ranked above it.
However, in recent years it looked as if the situation was finally improving. Until now.
In March 2022, a sudden spike in violence saw 60 people killed in just one weekend.
In response, the government has launched another crackdown on the gangs.
As well as the state of emergency and mass arrests,
other harsh measures have now been introduced.
These include reducing the age of criminal responsibility,
longer prison sentences, and even restrictions on how the press can report gang-related crime.
But while many see this as necessary to challenge the scourge of gang violence,
it's also led to fears that the country's sliding towards authoritarianism .
The republic of El Salvador lies in Central America.
With the southern coastline on the Pacific Ocean,
to its northwest is Guatemala and to its north and east is Honduras.
At 21,000 square kilometres, or 8,100 square miles,
it is the 148th largest of the 193 members of the UN.
Its population currently stands at around six and a half million.
In 2020, its per capita GDP stood at US$3,800 - making it a lower middle-income country.
El Salvador has a long and rich history with human settlement in the country
thought to stretch back at least 1500 years.
In the early 16th century it was conquered by Spain; becoming a part of the Captaincy
General of Guatemala, in turn a part of the Vice-Royalty of New Spain.
As Spanish imperial rule collapsed at the start of the 19th century,
it was forcibly incorporated into Mexico.
However, in 1823, it joined with Costa Rica, Guatemala, Honduras and Nicaragua
to form the Federal Republic of Central America.
But by the end of the following decade the union has started to collapse and in 1841
El Salvador officially declared independence.
Although it briefly united with Honduras and Guatemala in 1896
to form the Greater Republic of Central America,
this disintegrated just two years later - again leaving the country as a wholly independent state.
Long plagued by political problems, in 1931 the country's civilian government was overthrown
by a coup - thus opening the way to what would eventually become 50 years of military rule.
However, by the late 1970s opposition to the regime was growing.
With mounting protests and strikes, on 15 October 1979 the country's president
was overthrown and forced into exile by a group of hard-line military officers.
Fearing that the country was on the verge of a marxist revolution,
the new regime launched a brutal crackdown on dissent.
As a result, the country was now plunged into civil war
as U.S.-backed government forces, supported by paramilitary death squads,
fought against the FMLN - an umbrella group of various left-wing organisations.
The 13-year conflict was marked by extreme brutality with widespread human rights
abuses including state-sanctioned murder, torture, kidnappings and disappearances.
Eventually, the civil war ended in January 1992 with a UN-brokered peace agreement.
As well as seeing the military step back from the country's politics,
the FMLN was legally recognised as a political party.
In total, it's estimated over 80,000 lives were lost
and more than a million people were displaced.
But hopes that the country would begin to recover and rebuild were short-lived.
Aside from several natural disasters, El Salvador now faced a deadly new challenge.
During the war, many Salvadorians had fled to the United States,
establishing a large community in and around Los Angeles.
There they soon became caught up in the city's growing gang culture.
This would eventually lead to two major gangs MS-13 and Barrio 18.
Crucially, for as long as the civil war continued in El Salvador
the growing gang violence was contained to the United States.
Convicted gang members couldn't be deported back to their home country.
However, once the conflict was over the United States began to expel them.
And as they returned they brought their gang ties with them.
From there, the situation escalated rapidly and by the start of the
millennium the country's gang problem was already spiralling out of control.
But while successive governments talked about a zero-tolerance approach to the issue,
efforts to crack down on the gangs proved largely ineffective.
Indeed, matters became steadily worse.
Aside from their battles against each other, the gangs - which now
have between 60 and 70 000 members - began targeting the police and security forces.
In March 2012, and to the surprise of many observers, the rival gangs reached a truce.
Under the terms of the deal, which was broken by a former FMLN commander and a Catholic bishop, and
tacitly endorsed by the government, certain public areas, such as schools, were declared off limits.
At the same time, attacks against the security forces decreased.
In return, steps were taken to reform the brutal prison system,
which often saw gang members held in terrible conditions.
At first, the truce seemed to be succeeding
and there was a rapid and significant drop in the violent death rate.
Indeed, it's estimated that within a year the number of murders had declined by 40 percent
from around 70 per 100,000 people to around 40 per 100,000.
However, the truce became increasingly unpopular in large parts of society
as well as within the police and security forces.
As many people saw it, the deal gave the gangs just too much power and was
allowing them to regroup after years of conflict.
In the end, the truce was short-lived.
In 2013, the supreme court ruled that the appointment of the justice minister,
who had been instrumental in the process, had been illegal.
Then, in June 2014, a new president took over.
Refusing to recognise the truce, and insisting that he'd develop his own
strategy for tackling the problem, the situation sharply deteriorated.
By 2015, the murder rate had shot up again - now exceeding
many of the world's worst conflict zones.
All this would have serious wider international effects.
As the killings increased, many thousands of Salvadorians fled the country.
Indeed, the scale of the exodus was such
that by 2016 they've become the second largest group of unauthorised migrants
into the United States and the largest single nationality legally granted asylum.
Crucially, images of refugees from El Salvador - as well as people fleeing violence in neighbouring
Guatemala and Honduras, which were also dealing with their own gang problems - helped feed
the anti-immigrant sentiment that would see Donald Trump win the US presidential race that same year.
Eventually, the situation began to turn around with the election of a new
young centrist president - Nayib Bukele - in May 2019.
Having promised to address the country's gang violence,
he quickly introduced a range of tough new measures.
These included major targeted crackdowns in the key gang heartlands
and significant increases in police and military spending.
At the same time, the government also started to introduce social programs
in the most poverty-stricken areas.
But, most controversially, reports emerge that government representatives had met
with jailed gang leaders and had even offered them
special privileges in return for reduced violence - a claim later denied by Bukele.
Regardless of whether the meetings took place or not, the government's efforts seemed to work.
By the end of 2020, the situation had improved dramatically.
The number of murders was down to a little over 1300 - a significant drop
from the six and a half thousand recorded just a few years earlier.
And on the 27 January 2021, President Bukele announced that the country had
gone a full 48 hours without a gun death for the first time in decades.
And despite a three-day outbreak of violence in November 2021 that left 40 dead,
the year ended with 1140 deaths - another improvement.
It was against this backdrop of a seemingly improving situation
that the latest surge of violence occurred.
On Saturday, 26 March 2022, 62 people were killed in a single
day - the highest daily death toll since the end of the civil war 30 years earlier.
While it isn't entirely clear exactly what led to the latest bout of killings,
the government was nevertheless quick to act.
As well as imposing the state of emergency, which has since been extended for another month,
police began rounding up thousands of suspected gang members - even
going as far as plastering images of leading detainees on its twitter feed.
On top of this, the country has introduced a raft of other new measures - many of
which have since been condemned by leading international human rights organisations,
including the UN Office for the High Commissioner for Human Rights.
But, perhaps most controversially, the government has also passed a
law criminalising reporting on gang activities that could 'generate panic
and anxiety amongst the general population' - an offence carrying up to 15 years in jail.
It's this legislation that's come in for particularly heavy criticism, not only from human
rights organisations but also from the US State Department, which is insisted that 'journalists
must have the freedom to do their jobs without fear of violence threats or unjust attention.'
But what makes all these steps particularly controversial
is that they come amidst growing concerns about the wider direction El Salvador is taking.
While president Bukele has enjoyed huge approval ratings within the country - often
exceeding 85 per cent - there have been growing fears about his increasing authoritarianism.
In September 2021, the United States even went as far as to sanction
five supreme court judges appointed to rule in favour of a second presidential term for Bukele
in contravention of a constitutional time limit.
In this sense, El Salvador now appears to be at a crucial juncture.
For almost 30 years, it's fought the problem of
gang violence - violence has made it one of the most dangerous countries in the world.
But over the past three years it seems to have really got to grips with the problem.
However, while it's clearly important to crack down on gang violence,
there nevertheless seems to be the danger that the charismatic young president is
using the problem of gang violence to cement his control over the country.
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