El Salvador institutionalizes wiretapping of its citizens

As of June 1, El Salvador will begin the operations of the Guarantee Courts, one of the figures included in the package of legal reforms submitted in 2022 to the legislative plenary session with an official majority with which the Attorney General of the Republic (FGR) will be able to Intervene the communications of citizens to carry out criminal investigations.

The package of reforms to the Judicial Organic Law, approved this week, after the observations made by President Nayib Bukele, empowers these courts to authorize the interventions requested by the FGR.

The legal changes were requested by the Supreme Court of Justice (CSJ), also controlled by the ruling party after dismissing the magistrates of the Constitutional Chamber in May 2021 and appoint judges related to the government in turn.

Bukele suggested postponing the entry into force of the new courts, which had initially been scheduled for January 1 of this year, and moving it to June 1, when the fourth anniversary of his five-year term is celebrated, “in order to promote an orderly and efficient transition to ensure the normal functioning” of the courts that change their functions.

Prosecutors will go to the new courts to request to intervene communications in order to develop criminal investigations, according to Legislative Decree 551, which endorses the change of functions of the Guarantee and Competition Courts “against organized crime”.

The CSJ has adapted some Justices of the Peace so that they work with the new regulations and at the disposal of the Public Ministry for the prosecution of criminal cases, according to Salvadoran media reports.

The establishment of these courts does not change the current powers of the FGR that under the state of exception It can carry out intervention of telecommunications and correspondence to all citizens without judicial authorization.

The state of exception that suppresses the constitutional guarantees of Salvadorans in the territory, including the rights of detainees, was approved for a fourteenth extension until June 15, 2023.

Civil society organizations and organizations in defense of freedom of expression rejected last year the reforms that included, among others, the so-called “Gag Law” that imposes sanctions on the media and journalists and that critics have described as an articulator of “prior censorship”. and surveillance by the State to the telecommunications of journalistic companies and employees.

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