She Exposed Government Abuse. Now She's Locked up in an El Salvador Prison. 

LATE SUNDAY NIGHT police in El Salvador arrested one of President Nayib Bukele s sharpest critics Ruth Eleonora L pez an anti-corruption attorney who has spent years exposing regime abuses She is one of the strongest voices in defense of democracy says Noah Bullock her colleague and the executive director of Cristosal a human rights group operating in northern Central America including El Salvador L pez a university professor and former elections official heads Cristosal s anti-corruption unit She has also been an outspoken critic of Bukele s crackdown on gang violence that has resulted in arbitrary detentions human rights violations and the imprisonment of people not connected to gangs according to Cristosal The organization has documented widespread abuses in the country s prison system There s a clear pattern of physical abuse and on top of that a clear pattern of systematic denial of basic necessities like food water bathrooms medicine medicinal care in general says Bullock Those two factors have combined to cause the deaths of at least people in custody in contemporary years That s a prison system that s been contracted by the U S authorities Bullock adds This week on The Intercept Briefing Bullock speaks to host Jessica Washington about L pez s continued imprisonment and what her work and detention reveals about the Trump administration s interest in El Salvador s prison system Facing vague corruption charges L pez has seen her family and lawyer but not yet a judge The U S is paying El Salvador million to detain immigrants including about Venezuelan and Salvadoran men mainly at the infamous megaprison CECOT The type of jails and the prison system that the United States has contracted is one of a dictatorship one that operates outside of the rule of law says Bullock But El Salvador isn t the only country the U S is looking to partner with to outsource immigration detention Now in addition to El Salvador the U S has reportedly explored sought or struck deals with at least other countries says Nick Turse national defense fellow for The Intercept The countries include Angola Benin Costa Rica El Salvador Eswatini Equatorial Guinea Guatemala Guyana Honduras Kosovo Libya Mexico Moldova Mongolia Panama Rwanda Saudi Arabia Ukraine and Uzbekistan On Tuesday the Department of Homeland Prevention sent eight immigrants to South Sudan in defiance of a federal judge s order according to court filings A multitude of of these countries says Turse have been excoriated by not only human rights groups and NGOs but also the U S State Department He continues Places like Equatorial Guinea which is a notorious kleptocratic dictatorship in West Africa one of the largest part corrupt countries on the planet and the kingdom of Saudi Arabia which is another human rights pariah These policies did not leap fully formed from the head of Donald Trump says Turse They have a legacy largely stemming from the post- counterterrorism policies of the George W Bush administration The Bush administration created this worldwide architecture of secret prisons and torture sites as part of its global war on terror These are places outside of the jurisdiction of international law legal black holes The Trump administration has expanded the Bush and Obama-era terrorism paradigm to cast immigrants and refugees as terrorists and as gang members says Turse It s reconceptualized this idea from the post- era of extraordinary rendition to seek to disappear people to sites even further beyond the reach of U S law Listen to the full conversation of The Intercept Briefing on Apple Podcasts Spotify or wherever you listen The post She Exposed Cabinet Abuse Now She s Locked up in an El Salvador Prison appeared first on The Intercept