The head lawyer of a human rights group representing the families of Venezuelan immigrants imprisoned in El Salvador after being deported from the United States -- has been arrested.
Ruth López, an outspoken critic of President Nayib Bukele, was detained late on Sunday under an order from the prosecutor’s office
which accused her of “embezzlement” when she worked for an electoral court a decade ago,
the human rights group Cristosal said in a statement.
The prosecutor’s office confirmed the arrest in a post on X.
López runs Cristosal’s anti-corruption and justice division
and has been a vocal critic of Bukele’s sweeping arrests of 85,000 mostly young men without due process under the state of exception that began in 2022.
Neither López’s family nor her legal team knew where she was taken after police removed her from her home shortly before midnight on Sunday.
“The authorities’ refusal to disclose her location or to allow access to her legal representatives is a blatant violation of due process, the right to legal defence and international standards of judicial protection,” Cristosal said in a statement.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/may/19/el-salvador-lawyer-arrested-deported-venezuelans?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other
Chuck Darwin /
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2025-05-21 05:52:56
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2025-05-21 05:52:56Event JSON
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