Venezuelan migrants being admitted at the Salvadoran terrorist prison CECOT. Photo: Presidency of El Salvador.
By Misión Verdad – Apr 21, 2025
The Terrorism Confinement Center (CECOT) mega-prison, inaugurated on January 31, 2023, has been touted as the largest in Latin America by Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele. Although it has a capacity for 40,000 people, it currently houses about 15,000 inmates, including more than 200 immigrants—mostly Venezuelans with no criminal record—sent there by the US administration under the Alien Enemies Act of 1798.
In addition to being a mega-prison, the facility has become a mega-business, as the Central American president plans to double its size to accommodate more immigrants deported from the United States. This would mean more revenue for his government, which built the facility without any oversight and receives more than US $20,000 for each deportee.
According to The Wall Street Journal, Bukele presented the expansion plan to US Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem during her visit last month. It is the only Salvadoran prison that is not at maximum capacity and overcrowded during the State of Emergency decreed by the president over three years ago, on March 27, 2022.
Last Sunday, the Salvadorian president posted a message to his Venezuelan counterpart, Nicolás Maduro, proposing an exchange: returning the 252 Venezuelans migrants deported by the United States (accused, without evidence, of belonging to the Tren de Aragua criminal organization) and held in the CECOT in exchange for Venezuela releasing the same number of detained opposition operators, whom he described as “political prisoners.”
Venezuelan Attorney General Tarek William Saab stated that Bukele is admitting to a punishable offense and accused him of “the crime of human trafficking, with the kidnapping of more than 260 Venezuelans in a maximum-security prison in that country.” He also urged Bukele to “identify what crime our compatriots have committed in Salvadoran territory and to present the lawyers assisting the kidnapped compatriots.”
What is a day like at CECOT?
Known for multiple reports of human rights violations within its walls, the CECOT is located in an isolated and arid area in Tecoluca, about 75 kilometers from the capital, San Salvador. Its construction involved 3,000 people, was supervised by a Mexican company, and, although its cost has been kept secret, it has been reported to have been around US $135 million.
The prison has 19 watchtowers over 15 meters high, with 600 military personnel guarding the perimeter. Some 1,000 guards and 250 police officers monitor every movement within the labyrinth of concrete, iron, asphalt, and steel.
Inmates are confined in large shared cells with a capacity of 100 people. They sleep on metal bunks without mattresses or sheets, and the toilets provide no privacy. The punishment cells lack light and ventilation and consist only of a cement bed and a toilet.
Daily life consists of absolute confinement, with breaks of up to 30 minutes a day in front of the cells for exercise. According to CNN, cell lights remain on 24/7, and outdoor recreation, visits, and calls are prohibited.
The prisoners are fed 450 grams of the same meal every day, consisting of beans, pasta, and two tortillas along with coffee or a sugary drink. They are not provided with utensils. Three times a week, they eat a hard-boiled egg and, occasionally, a sweet roll.
Prison State showcase
The current State of Emergency in El Salvador is a measure that halts the population’s Constitutional rights, and according to analysts, rising crime alone is no justification for it. Although initially presented as temporary, it has become a permanent suspension of Constitutional guarantees renewed monthly by the Legislative Assembly. This policy has led to the arrest of more than 85,000 people, according to official figures, while organizations denounce arbitrary actions and violations of fundamental rights.
The measure is being used as a “front” by CECOT, but there are compelling reasons that reveal it is illegal:
• Lack of transparency: In April 2022, the Legislative Assembly approved, without analysis, the Special Law for the Construction of Penitentiary Centers in the country. This allows the Executive Branch to conceal public information related to contracts, sources of financing, and other matters for 2022 and 2023. This law also disregards the Public Administration Procurement and Contracting Law (LACAP).
• Human rights violations: The United Nations (UN) Committee Against Torture has stated that there is a risk that CECOT may engage in torture or ill-treatment of detainees. Human Rights Watch accessed confidential data from the prison, which reflects a significant number of violations against prisoners, including minors.
The mega-prison does not represent the reality of the country’s prisons. An analysis by the Passionist Social Service (SSPAS) has reported 300% overcrowding in the remaining facilities and more than 6,889 victims of violations.
Bukele himself has acknowledged that his government arrested approximately 8,000 innocent people. The current prison population in El Salvador stands at 115,605, resulting in a rate of 1,824 prisoners per 100,000 inhabitants (almost 2% of the population) [this is the highest incarceration rate in the world and about three times that of the USA]. Furthermore, the SSPAS highlights the following:
There are three different prison systems, more symbolic than legal. One is the penitentiary system where they hold civilians, those who are not part of gangs and which the State is using in the Zero Leisure Plan because they’re probably saying ‘we can see what can be done with them.’ Then there are all the gang members, those who are being accused of organized crime and who are being labeled as gang members even though it hasn’t been proven; with them, rehabilitation isn’t even considered; they’re just expected to die in prison. And there’s a third system, the CECOT, which is the one they use to show themselves to the world.
The farce as an extortion mechanism
If Trump and Bukele agree on anything, it’s the instrumentalization of farce as a political tool. The US’s fake news has been analyzed by Misión Verdad; as for the Salvadoran president, numerous false claims have been detected in his speeches since he took office. In particular, during the global pandemic, he accused Italy of letting its elderly die to pressure the Legislative Assembly into approving a State of Emergency.
Investigations have revealed the president’s chameleon-like transformation, as he has deleted up to 144 posts from his X account that exposed his leftist past. Others have shown that he made deals with gangs to sell his security model based on discretion and effectiveness against the working classes, something the US Department of Justice is aware of. This is the same model that CECOT uses today to extort Venezuela.
Furthermore, last March, El País of Spain published a report on the arrest of 10 minors—between the ages of 12 and 17—as evidenced by a 10-second video recorded by one of the detainees, who was 15 at the time, in which some make gestures that the government associates with the Mara Salvatrucha or MS-13 criminal gang.
The case, which began in February 2024, was iconic for the Bukele administration and diverted attention from the Bitcoin crisis which exposed the flaws in using cryptocurrency as official currency. No gang phone numbers, photos, or incriminating chats were found on the young people’s cell phones, reminiscent of the fake tattoos in the case of Venezuelan migrants. However, these young people were expected to be confined in the CECOT.
Similarly, a CBS News report claims that at least three-quarters of the Venezuelans deported by the United States to CECOT had no criminal record and did not belong to any criminal gang.
President Petro Condemns Criminalization of Venezuelan Migrants by El Salvador’s Bukele
Bukele’s dismantling of the rule of law is championed by CECOT, a principle that occurs while the United States uses the same principle as an excuse to extort other countries. Meanwhile, Venezuela continues to demand, in multilateral forums and organizations, that the rights of detained Venezuelans be respected and that they be returned to their country of origin.
The strategy of exaggerating or falsifying realities to create regional and global exception mechanisms that allow for the achievement of objectives beyond established norms is clear, especially for those who do not align with their hegemonic pretensions.
The conditions experienced by inmates at CECOT demonstrate the prison-world system through which Trump, Bukele, and their admirers conceive of the rest of humanity: making the daily life of the “enemy” precarious while favoring and ignoring structural injustice.
The image of starved, outcast, and defenseless prisoners challenges the “international community,” which is content to issue platitude-filled statements in the face of a confessed mass abduction.
Translation: Orinoco Tribune
OT/JRE/SL
Misión Verdad
Misión Verdad is a Venezuelan investigative journalism website with a socialist perspective in defense of the Bolivarian Revolution
