The always fabulous Alberto Arce argues that El Salvador Throws Out Gang Truce and Officials Who Put It in Place for the New York Times. As you might be aware, the Salvadoran fiscalia has been arresting individuals involved with the 2012 gang truce, a truce that had the potential to be transformed into a more meaningful peace agreement. A real lost opportunity now that El Salvador has the world’s highest homicide rate.
So far, however, Douglas Melendez has only arrested one big fish, mediator Raul Mijango, and several lower-level individuals involved in implementing the truce. At the time of their arrests, I wondered how one could arrest those individuals but not David Munguia Payes and Mauricio Funes. Munguia Payes was the brainchild behind the truce and seemed to be working under the full authority of then President Mauricio Funes.
There seemed to be some talk, however, that the nearly two dozen individuals were arrested for committing a variety of crimes in carrying out the truce, not facilitating the truce per se.
According to Alberto, that other shoe might begin to drop. Melendez is now preparing to ask congress to impeach Munguia Payes and remove his immunity. He is now serving as defense minister in the Sanchez Ceren administration. Melendez has also set his sights on Ricardo Perdomo, who heads the country’s bank regulatory agency but served as director of intelligence during the truce. But Melendez might not stop there.
“We will go ahead with the prosecution, not only of the minister but of whomever it may be,” Mr. Meléndez told The New York Times in an interview this week.
That would seem to be former president Mauricio Funes, a man who denied his involvement in the truce the entire time that he had been involved in the truce. The Salvadoran government did not seem to have a plan when it facilitated a truce between and with the country’s two largest gangs. They had no resources in place when its existence was prematurely announced. They never took consistent ownership over the truce. They gave it every reason to fail.
Now, I am not entirely sure that they have a plan with how these arrests, and future ones one would expect, are going to contribute to the strengthening of the rule of law and the improvement of overall security in the country.
