El Salvador placed Trump deportees behind bars. Now continue their families.

Their loved ones were picked up by American immigration authorities, deported to El Salvador and then imprisoned in a notorious maximum security prison. Now more than a dozen families continue the Salvadoran government and accuse the illegal keeping their sons, brothers, cousins ​​and partners behind bars for almost two months.

The lawsuit, submitted on Friday Before the Inter-American Commission of Human Rights by a coalition of migrant law lawyers representing the families, 18 Venezuelan nationals that are held in the Terrorism Confinement Center, known as Cecot- A strict and sober mega channon In the center of a deportation agreement between El Salvador and the Trump government.

Since March, none of the families have had news about their captured relatives, most of whom had hanging or approved applications for asylum or other types of humanitarian protection in the United States, according to a copy of the suit that was seen by the New York Times.

“They are all deported without the correct process, excluded from any protection of the law and are in a situation of forced disappearance,” said Isabel C. Roby, a senior staff lawyer at Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights, one of the groups that the lawsuit shall.

Spokespersons of the government of El Salvador did not immediately respond to a request for comments.

The White House has found an important ally in the President of El Salvador, Nayib Bukele, to perform his deportation policy. At least 288 American deportees – mostly Venezuelans and a few dozen Salvadorans, including a man deported from Maryland in error – are in Cecot custody, the recent lawsuit estimates, but the exact number is not known because neither of the government has unveiled their identity.

The complaint asks for the committee order that the Bukele government had immediately released the 18 migrants in prison in prison and to facilitate their return to the United States or to another country where they would be safe.

In February, Mr. Bekele offered To record convicted criminals from the United States for a fee. In his discussions with American officials, The New York Times has learnedMr Bukele told them that he wanted proof that all Venezuelan migrants were in fact members of the Tren the Aragua gangA claim that the Trump government used to justify the deportations. But a Times research has not found any criminal recordOr found only small violations, for most men.

“Neither the Trump government, nor the Bukele regime have demonstrated a case in which a person has been established by a court as a member of a gang,” said Isabella Mosselmans, director of the Global Strategic Litigation Council for Refugee Rights, another organization that submits the lawsuit.

Instead, the decision to deport them has been familiar with ‘superficial characteristics,’ Mrs Mosselmans, said that nine of the men mentioned in the legal steps were accused on the basis of their tattoos.

Recent legal actions against other middle -American countries that had agreed to accept planeloads from people from the United States have had some impact. In March, Panama issued Almost all 112 migrants who were held in a remote jungle camp. And last month, Costa Rica Returned passports For people it had held it in a former pencil factory, so they can leave if they wanted to.

However, El Salvador is different.

To combat the gangs of his country, Mr Bukele imposed a state of emergency in 2022 so that he could suspend the normal procedural rights. Since then his government has been wiped out Thousands of gang members and innocent people In mass arrests. Human rights have tried to challenge the legality of the arrests, with little effect. Of the thousands of legal actions that have been submitted in recent years, only a handful of resolved are resolved.

Even if the Inter-American Commission rules for the claimants, lawyers in El Salvador warn that it can be difficult to put pressure on the government to do something.

“The Bukele regime did not care,” said Enrique Anaya, a constitutional lawyer near San Salvador, the capital, who interviewed the legal basis of the deportation agreement. “El Salvador will release these people alone and exclusively if the United States gives this permission to do this.”