He assured that an operation is already underway to locate and rescue four Salvadorans in Haiti.

On Wednesday, Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele issued a stern warning to Haitian gangs after the kidnapping of four Salvadoran citizens who were part of an international security mission deployed in Haiti.

RELATED: Haiti Seeks Security Guarantees Ahead of Dec. 13 Elections

The four missing men are members of the Gang Suppression Force, a United Nations-backed unit tasked with combating armed groups that control large swathes of the Caribbean country.

According to reports, the Salvadorans were ambushed last Sunday while returning to their base from a supermarket in the town of Croix-des-Bouquets, on the outskirts of Port-au-Prince.

The armored vehicle they were traveling in was hit by explosives and caught fire during the attack. Although the soldiers managed to escape the vehicle, their whereabouts have been unknown since.

Bukele assured that an operation is already underway to locate and rescue the four Salvadorans. The president emphasized that the hostages are technicians and support staff dedicated to humanitarian work and medical evacuations.

The text reads, “Bukele Launches Military Operation in Haiti to Rescue Four Nationals. The president of El Salvador, Nayib Bukele, kicked off this strategy in response to the alleged kidnapping of four military technicians held by Haitian gangs.”

The president warned gang leaders that the current operation “is nothing compared to what’s coming” if the hostages are not released alive. At the same time, he offered the “possibility” of avoiding further consequences through their prompt release.

Bukele also reiterated that his government has launched an intense offensive against gangs in El Salvador and affirmed that it will act decisively to protect its citizens.

The Gang Suppression Force and special units of the Haitian National Police are maintaining operations in the area where the kidnapping occurred. During recent clashes, several members of armed groups were killed.

The incident comes amid the serious security crisis in Haiti, where thousands of people have died in recent years due to gang violence. Haitian Prime Minister Alix Didier Fils-Aime described the search for the four Salvadorans as an absolute priority for the country’s authorities.

At least 10,561 gang members have been convicted by Salvadoran courts over the past four years since the start of the crackdown on gangs began in 2022, Attorney General Rodolfo Delgado detailed on Tuesday.

The post El Salvador Logs over 10,500 Gang Member Convictions Since 2022 appeared first on Breitbart.

The funds were channeled to private agencies to develop national and international advertising campaigns.

An investigation by the specialized media outlet Infodemia reported that the Nayib Bukele administration allocated at least US$76.6 million over the past seven years to advertising, media consulting, and strategic communication services funded with state resources.

RELATED:

Hidden Costs of Bukele Prison Model El Salvador Crisis 2026

According to the report, spending on institutional promotion has maintained an upward trend since Bukele took office in 2019, reaching its highest level during his administration in the first seven months of 2026.

The investigation indicates that the funds were channeled to private agencies to develop national and international campaigns, manage social media, purchase advertising space, organize events, and monitor media coverage by public bodies.

The journalists responsible for the analysis reviewed more than 2,150 public procurement processes and identified over 2,000 contracts related to communication and marketing services awarded to hundreds of companies and suppliers.

The report also questions the lack of transparency surrounding these expenditures, noting that the Presidency keeps information related to institutional advertising confidential and that some contracts are not available in public records.

Among the cases examined is Obermet company, historically linked to the Bukele family, which obtained a contract from the Ministry of Health in 2019 for communication services worth more than US$108,000, according to the analyzed documentation.

The text reads, “What happened in El Salvador happened in Colombia: false positives and judicial setups to claim they were winning the war in order to sell security. Bukele will have to release 45,000 innocents.”

The investigation also recalls that the company has been the “subject of previous scrutiny” for alleged conflicts of interest related to public contracts during the current Salvadoran president’s political career.

Another finding concerns the financing of advertising space in Diario El Salvador, a newspaper that reportedly received more than one million dollars through hundreds of contracts from various state entities.

Infodemia maintains that this newspaper has repeatedly published information deemed false, misleading, or presented out of context by fact-checkers, especially on issues related to public safety and national political activity.

The investigation also identifies contracts awarded to Lared, a company linked to influencer Porfirio Chica, to develop digital communication strategies aimed at promoting programs of state institutions.

The media outlet indicates that some of the agencies that benefited from contracts during the current administration had previously appeared in judicial investigations related to cases of corruption and misappropriation of public funds during previous governments.

teleSUR: JP

Source: Resumen Latinoamericano

El Salvador’s President Nayib Bukele announced on October 13 his intention to release nearly 50% of the prisoners accused of collaborating with gangs in the country. According to the president, the measure would involve early release, albeit conditional.

“We have a plan that would benefit roughly 50% (give or take) of the prisoners in El Salvador who have collaborated with gangs … In other words, early release – meaning they are guilty but are released conditionally. Released under supervision,” Bukele told the press.

In this regard, he said that his government would evaluate the situation of each detainee to keep the country free from the structural violence that has plagued it for decades: “Considering that we come from a country where violence was part of everyday life and gangs were the real government, the real dictatorship. These people lived under that yoke, but it is not the same to be among those who enforced it as it is to simply survive that reality.”

If we take into account the figure provided by the authorities (according to which nearly 100,000 people are currently detained on various charges) this could mean the release of tens of thousands of people.

Domestic criticism of El Salvador’s mass incarceration

Before Bukele took office, El Salvador was in the throes of a severe crisis of insecurity and violence. His administration imposed a perpetual state of emergency that began in 2022 and has led to the imprisonment of thousands of Salvadorans accused of belonging to gangs (or “maras”) that controlled large swaths of the Central American country.

And while the pacification of the streets has been celebrated by a significant portion of the population, the harsh actions of the government and its police and military forces have drawn criticism from various human rights organizations, which have accused the government of excessive use of force, mistreatment of prisoners, and the unjust detention of individuals who do not belong to gangs.

Read more: CECOT: Bukele’s mega prison where “the only way out is in a coffin”

Another criticism has been leveled at the practice of mass trials, which charge and convict a large number of people at the same time. Rights groups say this has led to countless errors in the treatment of individual defendants. Added to this are allegations of arbitrary detentions, crimes against humanity, and disappearances.

International outrage at 252 Venezuelans detained in El Salvador

The prison system implemented by Bukele in El Salvador has also faced international criticism. The Central American country became a focal point of controversy when hundreds of people deported from the United States were detained in the Salvadoran prison system, which drew widespread criticism of the Bukele government.

Bukele, however, had defended the decision and reaffirmed his alliance with the Donald Trump administration and his participation in the Washington-led geopolitical and military initiative known as Shield of the Americas.

Read more: Maduro gov’t negotiates return of 252 Venezuelans detained by US in El Salvador

The news of the possible release of tens of thousands of detainees sparked even more intrigue, considering that Bukele’s announcement came immediately after his conversation with US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, in which they discussed combating “malign foreign influence.” However, it remains unclear how the two issues are linked, according to El País.

President Laura Fernández of Costa Rica on Wednesday inaugurated the so-called High-Containment Center Against Organized Crime (CACCO), a mega-prison designed to hold 5,100 inmates under maximum-security conditions with the aim of isolating narcotics-trafficking gangs. The Costa Rican government seeks with this move to consolidate its tough-on-crime policy, the centerpiece of propaganda amid the security crisis, which is symbolized by the enormous penal complex modeled on Nayib Bukele’s approach.

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U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio urged Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele in a phone call on Tuesday to protect El Salvador’s critical infrastructure from what the State Department framed as malign foreign influences, which, EFE points out, potentially reference China (though the statement did not explicitly mention Beijing), and to vote against the Cuban government at the United Nations.

The Department of Sate also urged El Salvador to join the United States and like-minded partners to promote shared priorities at the UN.

RELATED: El Salvador Sets Feb. 28, 2027 Date For General Elections

On October 28, the UN General Assembly is scheduled to vote on the resolution Cuba presents each year calling for an end to the U.S. blockade. In 2025, the measure passed with 165 votes in favor, 7 against and 12 abstentions. El Salvador was absent from that vote.

Bukele has been one of the main Latin American allies of the Donald Trump administration since the start of Trump’s second term. Both governments even reached an agreement to deport migrants from the United States to El Salvador’s mega-prison, the Center for Terrorism Confinement (Cecot).

Rubio also maintains an intense strategy to reduce China’s influence in Latin America, a region where Beijing has made large infrastructure investments. His first trip as secretary of state, in 2025, took him to Panama, where he pressured the government to separate the canal from Chinese companies.

A federal appeals court will examine Tuesday whether a federal judge can proceed with a criminal contempt investigation into the Trump administration related to the deportation of Venezuelan migrants to El Salvador in March 2025.

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Saying that Cuba is in crisis is hardly news. It has been for decades. Nor is it news that Washington’s sanctions have worsened the health of an economy that is now on life support. Both statements are axioms. But talking about Havana is a high-risk sport.

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