EL SALVADOR – The United States is set to pay El Salvador US$6 million (S$8 million) to imprison 300 alleged members of the Venezuelan Tren de Aragua gang that it deports to the Central American country, for one year, the Associated Press reported on March 15, citing an internal memo.
“El Salvador confirms it will house these individuals for one (1) year, pending the United States’ decision on their long term disposition,” AP quoted a memo from El Salvador’s Foreign Ministry as saying.
El Salvador’s presidential office told Reuters it only knows what has been made public, while the White House and Venezuela’s Information Ministry did not immediately respond to Reuters’ requests for comment.
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio signalled during a visit in February that the country’s government had offered to host “dangerous criminals” deported from the US in its prisons.
Human rights groups have opposed the plan, citing reports of torture and deaths in custody in El Salvador, where President Nayib Bukele has spearheaded an anti-gang crackdown that has included mass trials and construction of a “mega prison.”
The move comes as the Trump administration pursues mass deportations of migrants, including agreements under which third countries accept citizens.
Washington in February designated Tren de Aragua and other criminal groups across the region as global terrorist organisations, a move some analysts said could expose to prosecution migrants who pay human smugglers.
Tren de Aragua has been blamed for a surge in crime in the Americas, and the US has accused it of activities including human smuggling, gender-based violence, money laundering and drug trafficking.
Separately on March 15, US President Donald Trump invoked a little-known 18th-century wartime law to declare Tren de Aragua as alien enemies who are “perpetrating, attempting, and threatening an invasion or predatory incursion against the territory of the United States.”
“All Venezuelan citizens 14 years of age or older who are members of TdA, are within the United States, and are not actually naturalized or lawful permanent residents of the United States are liable to be apprehended, restrained, secured, and removed as Alien Enemies,” he said in a proclamation. REUTERS
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