El Salvador's CECOT Prison: Torture as State Policy Against Venezuelan Migrants

El Salvador's CECOT Mega-Prison

• 💡 CECOT, the Terrorism Confinement Center in El Salvador, is the site of alleged torture and human rights abuses against Venezuelan immigrants.
• 🚀 252 Venezuelan immigrants were flown to El Salvador in the dead of night and imprisoned indefinitely at CECOT.
• ⏳ Detainees endured approximately four months of confinement and abuse without communication with the outside world before being released in a prisoner exchange.

Documented Abuses and Torture

• 💔 A new report by Human Rights Watch and Cristosal details systematic human rights violations within CECOT.
• 👊 Detainees reported being subjected to beatings almost daily upon arrival, when requesting food or water, or when being moved for medical care.
• 🚫 Food, water, and basic hygiene were often denied as forms of punishment or reprisal.
• ⛓️ A punishment cell known as "the island" was used for solitary confinement and regular beatings, with prolonged deprivation of food and water.
• ⚠️ Documented cases of sexual abuse were also reported.

Institutionalized Torture and Lack of Due Process

• 🎭 Torture is described as institutionalized state policy in Salvadoran prisons, with guards operating on a protocol rather than isolated incidents.
• 👤 Guards at CECOT reportedly wore hoods and used aliases, attempting to hide their identities while inflicting abuse.
• ⚖️ The Venezuelan immigrants were imprisoned without due process, judges, or convictions, with allegations of being national security threats deemed unfounded by the report.
• 🚫 Many of the individuals had open asylum claims pending in the U.S. and had fled persecution in Venezuela.

Secrecy and Lack of Access

• 🌑 El Salvador's prison system operates under a state of emergency, denying families and lawyers access to inmates and public information.
• 🔒 Public information requests for the identities of those sent to CECOT were denied, and habeas corpus claims were not responded to by Salvadoran courts.
• 🌐 CECOT is described as a "judicial black hole" where individuals were disappeared with no access to their families, and no one had previously left the facility until this group of Venezuelans.
• 🗣️ Detainees were constantly threatened that they would never leave CECOT alive.