Repression
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The Salvadoran Parliament has adopted a text severely punishing the dissemination of messages from gangs. An additional repressive measure in a country placed under a state of emergency since the end of March.
True to form, the President of El Salvador, Nayib Bukele, took to Twitter to announce the new measure adopted by Parliament committed to his cause, on the night of Tuesday to Wednesday. In this small Central American state, journalists who broadcast messages from criminal gangs, maras, now face up to 15 years in prison. The same penalties apply to signs painted on buildings by members of these gangs to mark their territory. “When the Germans wanted to eradicate Nazism, they banned by law all Nazi symbols, as well as messages, apologies and anything that aimed to promote Nazism. Nobody said anything, it was understandable that it was like that. Now we are going to do the same with the gangs,” justified the Head of State in a message posted on his favorite social network.
Like Amnesty International which lamented “a reform that aims to silence the independent media”, several human rights NGOs have expressed concern about this text, as they have done since the end of March and the first repressive measures adopted by the government of El Salvador in the hope of stemming the surge in gang violence . Between the 25th and the…