El Salvador: Prosecutor's Office ends cooperation with anti-corruption commission

El Salvador: dismissals set alarms 4:56

(CNN Spanish) -

The Prosecutor's Office of El Salvador announced this Friday that it has decided to terminate the cooperation agreement with the International Commission against Corruption and Impunity in El Salvador (CICIES), signed in December 2019 by Raúl Melara, attorney general dismissed by the Legislative Assembly on May 1.

The current attorney general, Rodolfo Delgado, said that he will notify the CICIES that all types of cooperation will cease within 30 days.

The CICIES told CNN that it was not going to comment on this issue.

"Here we are open to working with the international community and receiving support to combat impunity, but it is not possible to receive this type of support from an organization that now has the advice of a criminal," Rodolfo Delgado assured in a press conference. , attorney general.

Why are dismissals unconstitutional in El Salvador?

2:11

Delgado refers to Ernesto Muyshondt, who this Thursday was incorporated as an advisor to the Organization of American States (OAS).

advertising

Muyshondt has opened a criminal process in El Salvador since February 2020 for alleged electoral fraud and illegal negotiations.

The former mayor of San Salvador appears in videos meeting with gang members, prior to the 2014 elections, when he was a member of the COENA National Executive Council, of the ARENA Nationalist Republican Alliance party.

Muyshondt, who has denied the allegations in the past, reacted immediately on his Twitter account.

“To make myself an excuse not to fight corruption when the CICIES has found enormous findings of corruption during the pandemic of many officials of the regime.

Sad role of a prosecutor who is the government's wimp, "he said.

This Friday, the police reported the arrest of Muyshondt as he left a court.

Muyshondt, for his part, denounced the arrest and classified it as a "show."

Investigations of alleged irregularities in the purchase of medical supplies

Muyshondt refers to the files opened by the Prosecutor's Office during Raúl Melara's administration to investigate alleged irregularities in the purchase of medical supplies during the pandemic.

The government has rejected the allegations.

Several of these files were opened on the recommendation of the CICIES, as revealed by Commissioner Ronalth Ochaeta during a press conference after the meeting with the then attorney general, Raúl Melara, and the US special envoy to the northern triangle of Central America. Ricardo Zúñiga, during his visit to El Salvador last April.

“When we talk about the cost of corruption, we are not referring only to money, it is a break with full compliance with the democratic charter and the functions of a democratic State, we are referring to all the consequences caused by the absence of public funds in the social fabric, ”Zúñiga said then.

At that press conference, the special envoy announced the cooperation of US $ 2,000,000 to support CICIES in the fight against corruption.

Bukele's commitment to CICIES

Bukele bets on an anti-corruption commission 4:03

The operation of the CICIES was promoted by President Nayib Bukele through an executive decree in September 2019. «I have told my officials, in public and in private, that whoever robs myself I am going to put them in prison .

More if it does so during this pandemic, "said Bukele on May 27, 2020.

At that time, Bukele said that to make the use of public resources transparent, he would need audits from the International Commission Against Impunity (CICIES) and the Court of Accounts, the institution responsible for auditing the management of funds in El Salvador.