(NZ Herald)
Kevin Sieff 4 Mar 2019 2:20pm
They were given one of the most dangerous orders in policing: Take down MS-13.
They were bankrolled by the United States and trained by FBI agents.
But members of the Salvadoran police have been killed by the dozens in each of the past three years, most in attacks that investigators and experts blame on MS-13, an international street gang. At least nine officers were killed in the first month of this year.
Now, a number of El Salvador's police officers are fleeing the gang they were tasked with eliminating.
There is no list in either El Salvador or the United States of Salvadoran police officers who have fled the country. But the Washington Post has identified 15 officers in the process of being resettled as refugees by the United Nations and six officers who have either recently received asylum or have scheduled asylum hearings in US immigration courts.
In WhatsApp groups, police officers have begun discussing the possibility of a migrant caravan composed entirely of Salvadoran police - a caravana policial, the officers call it.
The exodus of Salvadoran police points to how the country's security forces have failed to break the stranglehold of organised crime. It also shows that among those seeking refuge in the United States during the Trump Administration are some of America's closest security partners.
Comments