Nayib Bukele inaugurated a mega-prison for 40,000 gang members in El Salvador: they say it is the “biggest in America”

The President of El Salvador, Nayib Bukelewho launched a “war” against the gangs 10 months ago, presented the jail this Tuesday “America’s largest”, where he will lock up 40,000 suspected gang members.

The mega-prison was built in an isolated rural area in a valley near Tecoluca, 74 kilometers southeast of San Salvador, and was inspected by Bukele himself.

The 166-hectare property has a dozen pavilions that occupy 23 hectares, explained the Minister of Public Works, romeo rodriguezon a national radio and television network.

Called by the governmentTerrorism Containment Center”, it has surveillance systems with video and scanner circuits for the review of those who enter.

“Any person belonging to a terrorist structure is the one who is going to enter this confinement center,” said the Vice Minister of Justice and Public Security, osiris moon.

Is about “the largest jail in all of America”, highlighted Minister Rodríguez.

The prison has a 2.1 kilometer perimeter wall, which will be guarded day and night by 600 soldiers and 250 police officers. Inside, security will be in charge of guards from the General Directorate of Penal Centers.

The cells are of reinforced concrete and they have thick steel bars. The prison has its own wells to extract drinking water.

Luna anticipated that the inmates will have to work in this prison.

Bukele affirmed that previous Salvadoran governments “had gang members [presos] with prostitutes, with [equipos de] PlayStation, with screens, with cell phones, with computers […]rewarding the delinquent.

The president did not specify when the first of the almost 63,000 suspected gang members detained in the framework of the war against gangs will be transferred to the mega-prison.

The massive arrests, criticized by human rights organizations, are protected by a exception regime that allows arrests without a warrant. It was approved by Congress at the request of Bukele in response to a homicidal escalation that claimed the lives of 87 people from March 25 to 27.

On Friday, the organization Human Rights Watch (HRW) denounced that there is “extreme overcrowding” in Salvadoran prisons as a result of the arrests of suspects without a warrant.

The country’s twenty prisons currently have a capacity for 30,000 prisoners.

Bukele had initially said that the mega-prison would be finished in September. The authorities have not explained the causes of this delay.

(With information from AFP)

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