Bukele offers Trump his megacárcel for criminals captured in the United States

The governments of the United States and El Salvador signed on Monday two agreements with implications of impact for the entire region: on the one hand, the Central American country promised to receive criminals captured in the United States in their prisons, including US citizens. And on the other, Washington promised to boost El Salvador in the development of nuclear energy.

“We have offered to the United States of America the opportunity to outsource part of its penitentiary system,” said President Nayib Bukele in his X account. “We are willing to admit only to convict criminals (including convicted US citizens) in our mega prison (CECOT) in exchange for a rate. The rate would be relatively low for the United States, but significant for us and would make our entire prison system sustainable. ”

The agreements were given within the framework of the visit of the United States Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, to the Central American country as part of its first tour of the region. Bukele described the agreement as something “unprecedented,” while Rubio highlighted the Salvadoran president as a “consistent” leader with the interests of the North American country.

El Salvador has the largest prison in Latin America, the Center for Confinement for Terrorism (CECOT), where more than 20,000 gang members of the Mara Salvatrucha 13 and neighborhood 18, the two most powerful gangs in the region that were Disarticulated by Bukele. According to information provided by Bukele, the enclosure has capacity for 40,000 inmates. To date, it is not known exactly how many quotas are available.

According to the specialized World Prison Brief site, El Salvador is the country with the highest imprisonment rate in the world, with 1,659 people prey per 100,000 inhabitants. This figure greatly doubles to second place, Cuba, which currently has 794 prisoners per 100,000 inhabitants.

So far, the Government has not explained its strategy to receive criminals from foreign criminal structures or what measures will take to strengthen the security of megaprision.

Since 2022, President Bukele triggered his popularity after promoting a brutal exception regime, which captured more than 80,000 people without giving them a fair defense opportunity. Human Rights Defense Organizations have denounced more than 3,000 unjustified arrests and more than 300 deaths without judging within the prison since the measure began.

This has obtained the approval of the Salvadoran population amid many criticisms, but in addition to other leaders in the region. Rubio highlighted the reduction of violence during his encounter with Bukele in his residence located in Lake Coatepeque, one of the most exclusive areas of El Salvador.

An agreement on nuclear energy

On the other hand, Rubio referred to the Cooperation Pact to boost nuclear energy in El Salvador as his first agreement signed as Secretary of State, and said that, with him, the United States seeks that the Central American country be a place “where all the Technologies, all industries, all promises of this new century can be found. ”

The agreement, appointed Memorando of Understanding on Strategic Civil Cooperation (NCMOU), was signed by the Salvadoran counterpart, Foreign Minister Alexandra Hill Tinoco, who said that it is “one more strategy” of President Bukele to “give energy 24 hours a day at a competitive price without depending on geopolitics or oil prices. ”

The authorities also did not give major explanations about this new agreement. In the last month, the Salvadoran population has rejected the return of metal mining after seven years of prohibition for its negative implications in the environment. Bukele, on the other hand, has been made of deaf ears before the protests that include pronouncements of the Catholic Church, backed in scientific studies generated by the same government. The president has assured that, with the money they receive from metal mining, they will clean the rivers that are contaminated.

Rubio’s visit to El Salvador was the second stop of the Secretary of State on his first official trip, which has also taken him to Panama. On Tuesday, at 7.15 in the morning, he plans to fly to Costa Rica and from there he will go to Guatemala and the Dominican Republic.