AMERICA/EL SALVADOR - Archbishop of San Salvador tells Fides: “Prison inmates have lost their right to freedom, but certainly not their rights as a person ”

San Salvador (Agenzia Fides) – After episodes of violence in two prisons in El Salvador, in which 2 prisoners were killed and more than 20 injured in the Penitentiaries of Cojutepeque (central) and Sonsonate (west), the Archbishop of San Salvador, Mgr José Luis Escobar Alas, appealed to the authorities to take measures to improve living conditions in places of detention. Since April 11th prison inmates have staged protests which resulted in clashes.
Archbishop Escobar Alas told Fides about the situation with: “I have always thought that life in prison is inhuman and must be improved. I do not mean justice should be abolished, but the assistance given must be worthy of the person”.
El Salvador has 19 detention centres, equipped to hold a maximum of 8,000, but at present with a total 23,000 prisoners. Despite this overcrowding, the prison authorities have stopped work on the construction of 2 new centres. “The crisis in our prisons aggravates the sense of insecurity all over the country” said Archbishop Escobar Alas, who repeats his appeal to the government to make a serious investigation into the country's security system and in particular in prisons, because the situation is now very difficult to handle and threatens to cause the national security system to collapse.
The Catholic Church in El Salvador, present with Prison Pastoral Care in every detention centre in the country, is acknowledged by the authorities as the principal channel for the rehabilitation of prisoners. “The State must keep control but people who make a mistake and break the law cannot be denied their human rights. “Prison inmates have lost their right to freedom, but certainly not their rights as a person ” the Archbishop of San Salvador concluded. (CE) (Agenzia Fides, 04/05/2010)