The Organization of American States and the government of El Salvador signed a cooperation agreement on April 8 on cooperation, establishing a security assistance committee to support the Central American nation’s internal peace process. That effort has so far achieved a truce between the nation’s two main gangs, MS-13 and Barrio 18. The gang truce, begun in March 2012 and negotiated with the assistance of El Salvador’s military bishop, Fabio Colindres, and the social leader Raúl Mijango, has led to a significant drop in El Salvador’s homicide rate—to 5.9 murders per day from 14. The secretary general of the O.A.S., José Miguel Insulza, commented, “The truce between the gangs is just the beginning; changing the way of life of a significant number of young people, giving them hope, promoting peace and rehabilitating them is a much more complex task.”
Diminishing Violence In El Salvador
Show Comments (
)
Comments are automatically closed two weeks after an article's initial publication. See our comments policy for more.
The latest from america
A Homily for the Fourth Sunday of Easter, by Father Terrance Klein
Legally, the students at St. John Bosco are considered homeschooled. But their in-person school days, during which the students wear uniforms, are much like those at any other small school.
In a speech at his weekly general audience, Pope Francis said that the cardinal virtue of temperance “lets one enjoy the goods of life better.”
Organizers of the archdiocese‘s restructuring process have pointed out that there are far more seats available in the pews in the city than people attending Mass, and there are more funerals than baptisms.