With each passing year, the government of El Salvador increases its level of aggression against the press. The country that promotes itself as one of the safest in the Western Hemisphere is the same in which police and military personnel have normalized arbitrarily detaining journalists to search their phones, or photojournalists to make them delete their images.
In 2024, Salvadoran journalists' computers and telephones were searched and confiscated without due process or transparency of the court order; other colleagues were persecuted after covering a clandestine grave; and, in the center of San Salvador, police officers detained and harassed two colleagues to force them to delete information from their cameras and recorders.
The country, where the government preaches libertarian causes, may lose one of the greatest safeguards protecting the journalistic profession: The Public Prosecutor's Office is pressuring to find out the identity of the source of a particular article and, if it succeeds, it will set a (quack) legal precedent that violates the right to protect sources, which is safeguarded by the Constitution and the Penal Code of El Salvador and also has international protection according to Principle 8 of the Declaration of Principles on Freedom of Expression of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, of which El Salvador is a part.
Another trampling, another step backwards, and another lost right. These worrying actions seem to be part of a larger plan: In November the Legislative Assembly also approved —in an expedited manner and without dialogue with experts— mechanisms so that anyone offended by a journalistic investigation, regardless of whether they are a politician under scrutiny or a “politically exposed person,” can invoke the “right to be forgotten”. This also means that the state will be able to initiate processes to eliminate information of public relevance about acts of corruption denounced by the press.
The new law, which also created a State Cybersecurity Agency, paved the way for authorities to investigate the sources of information for press investigations. The agency will settle various types of requests for the media to open up their datasets and sources to third parties.
According to data compiled by the Salvadoran Journalists’ Association (APES), the government of El Salvador has promoted a generalized anti-press attitude, which is spreading well-founded fear to all the newsrooms of all the media in the country. In 2024, the APES Monitoring Center registered 466 reports of attacks against journalists and news workers. “Public officials” and “state entities” have been the main aggressors reported, with 131 and 128 incidents respectively — more than half of the incidents (259).
In 2024, there were 155 more attacks than in 2023 (311 attacks); and 279 more than in 2022, when 187 were recorded. The most repeated aggressions last year were: restriction on the practice of journalism (113 aggressions in total: 93 restrictions due to blockages on social networks by public officials and institutions and 20 restrictions in physical spaces); blocking of access to information (93 aggressions); digital harassment (62 aggressions); stigmatizing statements (58 aggressions), and defamation (21 aggressions).
Of these 466 attacks, the most common reported perpetrators were: public officials (131 attacks); public institutions (128 attacks); social media users (65 attacks); National Civil Police agents (31 attacks), and unknown individuals (23 attacks).
The anti-press hostilities will turn into more violence and more arbitrariness, a sore spot in the propaganda of a safe country. Without an independent, investigative press, not aligned with or kneeling before the powers that be, El Salvador can only presume to be as safe as Nicaragua, Cuba, or North Korea: countries that are “safe” for tourism, but without freedom of the press or expression.
Although they are not the majority, cases of abuse and intimidation by the National Civil Police (PNC) and the military are particularly worrying, as they have been one of the fastest growing areas of complaints. The 38 aggressions documented in this area reveal a pattern of abuse of authority that not only seeks to silence journalists, but also threatens the safety of their families.
It is serious that our Monitoring Center has had to record, for the first time, a raid on the home of a journalist, our colleague Mónica Rodríguez, who had her personal and work phones and computers taken from her in an operation by masked prosecutors. This was a highly opaque procedure, as Mónica was not informed in detail and was not able to formally see the court order. To date, no further explanation has been given, despite the fact that our lawyers at APES have tried to get the Attorney General’s Office to respect due process.
Intrusion into the private lives of journalists is a serious violation that cannot be tolerated in a society that promotes freedom.
The mother of a freelance journalist and editor was the victim of police intimidation and harassment at her home, following the publication of a journalistic investigation that her son edited, revealing the existence of a network of police officers linked to the murder of hundreds of people. The complaint states that PNC agents parked in front of his mother’s house for three consecutive days and, on October 30, a group of security forces approached the house claiming to be responding to a report of domestic violence and interrogated the editor's mother about the names of all her children, showing particular interest in the sons. They also took photographs of the Unique Identity Documents (DUI) of other family members who were in the house.
Another incident involving security forces occurred on Aug. 23, 2024, when PNC officers threatened a woman journalist and a photojournalist who were reporting on the arrest of a person who was cleaning the windshields of cars driving past Cuscatlán Park in San Salvador. The journalists approached the scene to document the situation, duly identified as press, but one of the officers forbade them from taking photographs of the event, even though they were on a public road. She also warned them that if they published the photographs “they already knew” which media they belonged to.
In a safe country, there should be no fear in crime scenes guarded by police, as the press has always covered them. On Oct. 4, 2024, while covering the excavation of a clandestine grave in the Cumbres de San Bartolo neighborhood in Tonacatepeque, three journalists were arbitrarily detained by PNC agents. An agent recorded them with his cell phone and took photographs of the license plate of the vehicle in which the journalists were traveling. According to the journalist's account, the same patrol car followed them for a long time as they left the neighborhood heading toward the capital.
In addition to these 38 cases, 13 pertained to situations of fear and persecution of journalists by state security forces, suggesting that the climate of insecurity is not only real, but also on the increase. The reports of surveillance and being followed by PNC agents and unknown individuals are not mere coincidences, especially if they are on the increase and generate a state of constant alert and mistrust among those who inform the public.
In this context, 2025 does not bode well for the press. It is essential that citizens, human rights organizations, and the media itself come together to demand an immediate end to these attacks and to demand a safe environment that allows for the free and responsible practice of journalism. In a safe country, an environment brimming with fear is not normal.
We cannot allow fear and repression to silence those who only want to shed light on the gray or dark areas of reality. To defend the press is, ultimately, to defend the right to know. If the situation for journalists does not improve by 2025, we will take another step toward a darker future, where quality and critical information will be an unattainable luxury.
This is the hostile context of 2024: more hostile than 2023 and much more so than 2022. This 2025 began with storms, but we will continue to keep a record.
Sergio Arauz is the deputy editor of El Faro and president of the Salvadoran Journalists’ Association (APES).
