U.S., El Salvador Disappearing and Arbitrarily Detaining Salvadorans Deported From the U.S., Human Rights Watch Claims

One year after El Salvador began receiving deportees at its Terrorism Confinement Center, a new report by Human Rights Watch says the Central American country is disappearing and arbitrarily detaining Salvadorans deported from the United States.

Since the Trump administration and Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele reached an agreement for the Central American country to receive deportees in its mega prison, detainees, human rights activists and other organizations have denounced a wide range of violations taking place at the facility, including torture, sexual abuse and inhumane conditions.

The report was based on 20 interviews with relatives and lawyers of 11 Salvadorans who were deported from the United States between March and October of last year and were immediately detained in El Salvador. According to the report, they have not been allowed to communicate with either their relatives or their lawyers.

As noted in the investigation, there has been no indication from authorities that the men have been brought before a judge since their arrival, and some have not been informed where they are being held or why.

“Whatever the criminal history of these Salvadoran men, they have a right to due process, to be taken before a judge, and their relatives are entitled to know where they are being held and why,” Juanita Goebertus, Americas director at Human Rights Watch, said in the report. “Deportation cannot mean enforced disappearance.”

According to an analysis of Immigration and Customs Enforcement data by Human Rights Watch, of the at least 9,000 Salvadorans deported to El Salvador since January 2025, only 10.5 percent had a conviction in the United States for a violent or potentially violent crime.

The report went on to say that most of the relatives interviewed said they tried to locate their loved ones using ICE’s Online Detainee Locator System but were unsuccessful, adding that U.S. officials told them their relatives had been deported to El Salvador without notice.

Meanwhile, Salvadoran authorities also refused to provide any information about their whereabouts, claiming they “lacked a legal mandate” or that they had no record of them.

That was the case for the mother of a deportee who had lived in the United States for 11 years before being deported to El Salvador in March of last year. She told the human rights watchdog that when she tried to locate him using ICE’s online tools, no results appeared. She then sought legal support, but according to the woman, several lawyers told her they could not take the case because they feared government reprisals.

“I called several institutions — the Attorney General’s Office, the Ombudsperson’s Office, a migrant shelter and government ministries in El Salvador — but they gave me no information,” the woman recalled. “At the Ombudsperson’s Office, they told me that due to the state of emergency, they were not obligated to provide me with information. I feel abandoned.”

A tactic the Salvadoran government has used to deprive many detainees of their rights has been the state of emergency put in place in March 2022, which has been used to suspend the rights to be informed promptly of the grounds for arrest, to remain silent, to legal representation and the requirement to present detainees before a judge within 72 hours of arrest, among others.

As noted in the report, under international law an enforced disappearance takes place when authorities deprive a person of their liberty and then refuse to disclose that person’s fate or whereabouts, placing them outside the protection of the law. In its report, Human Rights Watch called on leaders in the region to stop such abuses.

“The desperation of families to find disappeared loved ones evokes the darkest days of dictatorships in Latin America,” Goebertus said. “The United States should stop casting people into the black hole of El Salvador’s prison system.”

Originally published on Latin Times