El Salvador
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Despite more than $1.2 billion in U.S. assistance since 2008, perceptions of citizen security in Central America have continued to decline and rates of violent crime have continued to rise, contributing to large numbers of children and families fleeing for the United States in recent years. In light of the worsening situation in Central America,
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The Salvadoran news website La Página reported yesterday that the opposition ARENA party plans to introduce a bill to deploy some 10,000 military reservists in 22 of the country’s most violent cities. The proposal is likely an attempt to politicize the increasing violence in El Salvador in the wake of a tenuous gang-government truce forged in 2012 that seems to have come undone. El
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Human Rights Watch released a report last week highlighting the apparently systemic failure of U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) to properly screen Central American migrants, particularly Hondurans, for “credible” or “reasonable” fear of returning to their countries of origin. According to data obtained from CBP via a Freedom of Information Act request, “the vast
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General John Kelly, Commander of U.S. Southern Combatant Command, told an audience at the National Defense University on October 8 that Central American governments should seek to replicate “the miracle of Colombia” when it comes to security. Colombia is “a great example,” said Kelly, “of what can be done so long as a government and a
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At the 27 June 2014 Central American Integration System (SICA) meeting, Costa Rican President Luis Guillermo Solís Rivera described the flight of emigrants and refugees (especially unaccompanied children) from the so-called Northern Triangle countries of Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador as “one of the greatest tragedies of our region…” Read this piece in its entirety at Southern
Mike LaSusa 