SAN SALVADOR, Dec 3 (Reuters) – El Salvador’s President Nayib Bukele announced Saturday the deployment of 10,000 security forces to a suburb of San Salvador known to be a stronghold for gangs.
The move is the latest escalation in a crusade against gang violence that began in March, which human rights groups say has been marred by unjustified detentions.
“Soyapango is totally surrounded,” the president wrote on Twitter early Saturday, referring to the municipality in the eastern part of the capital region known to be a stronghold of the Mara Salvatrucha and Barrio 18 gangs.
“8,500 soldiers and 1,500 agents have surrounded the city, while extraction teams from the police and the army are tasked with extricating all the gang members still there one by one.”
[1/5] Troops walk in the suburb of Soyapango, after El Salvador’s President Nayib Bukele announced the deployment of 10,000 security forces to the troubled area which for years has been considered a stronghold of the violent Mara Salvatrucha and Barrio 18 gangs, in San Salvador, El Salvador December 3, 2022. REUTERS/Jose Cabezas
Government representatives declined to comment on the deployment.
Images released by the government showed troops carrying heavy weapons, helmets and bulletproof vests, traveling in war vehicles. The municipality has a population of about 300,000 and was previously considered impregnable for law enforcement.
Since he began his plan to combat gangs, Bukele has ordered the arrest of more than 50,000 alleged gang members, whom he describes as terrorists and has denied basic procedural rights to.
The plan aims to reduce the Central American country’s homicide rate to less than two a day, after dozens of Salvadorans were killed in a single weekend in March.
Reporting by Gerardo Arbaiza; Edited by Noé Torres and Alexander Villegas and Franklin Paul
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SAN SALVADOR, Oct 10 (Reuters) – The death toll from storm Julia rose to at least 25 on Monday, officials said, with most victims in El Salvador and Guatemala, as the weakening storm dumped heavy rain on a swath of Central America and southern Mexico.
Salvadoran authorities reported the deaths of 10 people, including five soldiers, and said more than 1,000 people were evacuated.
In Guatemala, eight were killed between Sunday and Monday, according to officials, while seven were injured and hundreds more affected by the storm.
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Authorities in both El Salvador and Guatemala also canceled classes on Monday.
In Honduras, five victims have been confirmed including a woman who died Sunday after she was swept away by flood waters, and a four-year-old boy in a boat that capsized near the Nicaragua border on Saturday night, officials said.
Panama’s emergency services confirmed later on Monday two deaths as a result of heavy rains, with around 300 people evacuated from communities near the country’s border with Costa Rica.
Julia made landfall Sunday on Nicaragua’s Caribbean coast before crossing into the Pacific Ocean.
By Monday afternoon, Julia had dissipated and what was left of the storm was moving northwest at 15 miles per hour (24 km/h) over Guatemala near the border with Mexico, according to the U.S. National Hurricane Center (NHC).
The Miami-based NHC estimated Julia’s maximum sustained winds at about 30 mph (45 km/h).
The NHC warned of life-threatening surf and rip conditions along the coasts of El Salvador and Guatemala, while heavy rain could still cause flash flooding.
It predicted an additional one to four inches of rain in El Salvador and southern Guatemala, and three to six inches on Mexico’s Tehuantepec isthmus.
The storm system is expected to weaken further Monday, the NHC said.
Honduran authorities added that 9,200 people sought refuge in shelters.
In Nicaragua, Julia left a million people without power and heavy rains and floods forced the evacuations of more than 13,000 families.
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Reporting by Nelson Renteria in San Salvador; Additional reporting by Gustavo Palencia in Tegucigalpa, Eli Moreno in Panama City; Enrique Garcia in Guatemala City and Brendan O’Boyle in Mexico City; Editing by Richard Chang and Kim Coghill
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Suspected driver charged with human trafficking offense
Driver had meth in his system, lawmaker and U.S. official say
SAN ANTONIO, June 30 (Reuters) – The suspected driver of a truck packed with dozens of migrants who died in blazing heat during a Texas smuggling attempt was allegedly under the influence of methamphetamine when police encountered him, a U.S. lawmaker told Reuters, citing information from law enforcement.
San Antonio police officers found Homero Zamorano Jr, a Texas native, hiding in brush near the abandoned tractor-trailer on Monday, according to documents filed in federal court on Thursday. Fifty-three migrants lost their lives, making it the deadliest such trafficking incident on record in the United States.
U.S. Representative Henry Cuellar, a Democrat whose district includes the eastern part of San Antonio, told Reuters on Thursday that Zamorano was found to have had methamphetamine, a powerful synthetic drug, in his system.
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Cuellar said he was briefed on the matter by U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP), but did not know how authorities made that determination. A CBP official, speaking on the condition of anonymity, separately told Reuters that Zamorano had methamphetamine in his system.
Reuters was not immediately able to independently confirm the accounts of the alleged drug use.
Zamorano, 45, appeared in federal court in San Antonio on Thursday where human trafficking charges against him were read. If convicted, he faces a maximum sentence of life in prison or the death penalty and up to a $250,000 fine, he was told.
He was accompanied by public defender Jose Gonzalez-Falla, who declined to comment on the case. U.S. Magistrate Judge Elizabeth Chestney said Zamorano would be held in custody until his next hearing, on July 6.
Officials described finding the trailer’s rear door ajar with bodies stacked inside that were hot to the touch. In nearby brush, officers discovered other victims, some deceased. They found Zamorano hiding near the victims and escorted him to a local hospital for medical evaluation, prosecutors said. Mexican officials said he had tried to pass himself off as one of the survivors.
‘WHERE YOU AT?’
The truck had been carrying migrants from Mexico, Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador and was found in a desolate, industrial area near a highway on the outskirts of the U.S.-Mexico border.
Temperatures in the area that day had soared as high as 103 Fahrenheit (39.4 Celsius), and authorities called to the scene found no water supplies or signs of working air-conditioning inside the cargo trailer.
Prosecutors allege Zamorano conspired with Christian Martinez, 28, who was also charged with a human trafficking offense. Martinez on Monday sent a photo of a truck load manifest to Zamorano, who responded by saying, “I go to the same spot,” a federal investigator wrote in a court filing Wednesday.
Martinez repeatedly messaged Zamorano in the hours after but received no reply, wrote Nestor Canales, a special agent with Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s (ICE) investigations division. Martinez sent messages including “Call me bro” and “Wya bro,” meaning “where you at,” Canales wrote.
A confidential informant for ICE and the Texas police spoke with Martinez after the incident, Canales wrote. Martinez told the informant, “The driver was unaware the air conditioning unit stopped working and was the reason why the individuals died,” Canales added.
Reuters was unable to reach Martinez for comment. Martinez, who is in official custody, made an initial appearance in a court in the Eastern District of Texas on Wednesday.
‘STASH HOUSE’
Along with 27 Mexicans, the victims included 14 Hondurans, eight Guatemalans and two Salvadorans, Mexican and Guatemalan officials said. Others, including minors, remain hospitalized.
A spokeswoman for Guatemala’s foreign ministry told Reuters it was unclear whether two of the Guatemalans identified Thursday had died on Monday or at a later date.
Among the dead were Pascual Melvin Guachiac, 13, and Juan Wilmer Tulul, 14, both from Guatemala, the country’s foreign ministry wrote on Twitter.
The two were cousins who left home two weeks ago to escape poverty, Guachiac’s mother was quoted as saying by Guatemalan media. read more
Also among the victims was Yazmin Nayarith Bueso, who left Honduras nearly a month ago. Her brother said she had gone a year without a job. “She looked and looked and couldn’t find anything, and became desperate,” Alejandro Bueso told a Honduran television program on Thursday.
Officials believe the migrants boarded the truck on the U.S. side of the border with Mexico.
Surveillance photographs captured the truck passing through a border checkpoint at Laredo, Texas, at 2:50 p.m. CT (1950 GMT) on Monday, before the migrant passengers are believed to have boarded.
Cuellar, the Texas lawmaker, said the migrants had likely crossed the border and gone to a “stash house” before being picked up by the trailer and passing the Encinal checkpoint. They likely then went into San Antonio and experienced mechanical issues that left them in the back of the truck without air conditioning or ventilation, Cuellar said.
Another truck carrying migrants headed for San Antonio evaded the Encinal checkpoint on Thursday, crashing into the back of a tractor-trailer after a chase and killing four on board, according to Mexican authorities. read more
Two other men suspected of involvement in Monday’s incident, Mexican nationals Juan Claudio D’Luna-Mendez and Francisco D’Luna-Bilbao, were charged on Tuesday in U.S. federal court with possessing firearms while residing in the country illegally. A preliminary hearing for the pair is set for Friday.
D’Luna-Mendez’s attorney, Michael McCrum, said his client is a 21-year-old carpenter who has been in the U.S. since childhood and had “nothing to do with” the tragedy. McCrum said he believed the other man charged was his client’s father.
Charging documents in the case said the truck’s registration was tracked to the men’s address. “They are arresting anyone they can,” McCrum said.
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Reporting by Jason Buch and Julio-Cesar Chavez in San Antonio, Ted Hesson in Washington; Additional reporting by Gustavo Palencia in Tegucigalpa, Sofia Menchu in Guatemala City and Kylie Madry in Mexico City
Writing by Rami Ayyub; Editing by Mica Rosenberg, Aurora Ellis and Leslie Adler
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LOS ANGELES, June 10 (Reuters) – U.S. President Joe Biden and fellow leaders from the Western Hemisphere on Friday rolled out a new set of measures to confront the regional migration crisis, seeking to salvage an Americas summit roiled by division.
Biden’s aides had touted the migration declaration as a centerpiece of the U.S.-hosted Summit of the Americas, and 20 countries joined him for a ceremonial unveiling of the plan – though several others stayed away.
Capping the summit’s final day, the White House promoted a series of migrant programs agreed by countries across the hemisphere and Spain, attending as an observer, which pledged a more cooperative approach. But analysts were skeptical that the pledges are meaningful enough to make a significant difference.
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Those measures include the United States and Canada committing to take more guest laborers, providing pathways for people from poorer countries to work in richer ones, and other countries agreeing to greater protections for migrants. Mexico also will accept more Central American workers, according to a White House statement.
“We’re transforming our approach to manage migration in the Americas,” Biden said. “Each of us is signing up to commitments that recognizes the challenges we all share.”
The flags of 20 countries, several fewer than the number attending the summit, festooned the stage where Biden led the rollout. But that number was only achieved after days of U.S. pressure.
It was another sign of tensions that have marred the summit, undermining Biden’s efforts to reassert U.S. leadership and counter China’s growing economic footprint in the region.
That message was clouded by a boycott by several leaders, including Mexico’s president, to protest Washington’s exclusion of leftist U.S. antagonists Cuba, Venezuela and Nicaragua. The line-up was thinned to 21 visiting heads of state and government.
The administration, facing a record flow of illegal migrants at its southern border, pledged hundreds of millions of dollars in aid for Venezuelan migrants, renewed processing of family-based visas for Cubans and Haitians and eased the hiring of Central American workers. read more
The announcements were part of the unveiling of U.S.-led pact dubbed the “Los Angeles Declaration” and aimed at spreading responsibility across the region to contain the migration problem.
The plan culminates a summit designed to re-establish U.S. influence among its southern neighbors after years of relative neglect under former President Donald Trump. Biden proposed an economic partnership to help the region’s pandemic recovery – though it appears to be a work in progress.
But at the summit’s opening on Thursday, leaders from Argentina and tiny Belize rebuked Biden over the guest list, underscoring the challenge the global superpower faces in restoring its status among poorer neighbors.
On Friday, Chile, Bolivia, the Bahamas, St. Lucia, Barbados and Antigua and Barbuda joined the criticism, though Biden was not present.
“No one should exclude another country,” Mexican Foreign Minister Marcelo Ebrard, sitting in for President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, said from the podium.
U.S. President Joe Biden, Brazil’s President Jair Bolsonaro, Colombia’s President Ivan Duque and other heads of delegation pose for a family photo during the Ninth Summit of the Americas in Los Angeles, California, U.S., June 10, 2022. REUTERS/Mike Blake
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The sessions this week regularly rang out to U.S. composer’s John Philip Sousa’s “The Liberty Bell” march, popularized by the classic British comedy show “Monty Python’s Flying Circus.”
‘THERE’S NOTHING HERE’
U.S. officials scrambled until the last minute to persuade skeptical governments to back the plan.
The leaders vowed in the declaration “to strengthen national, regional and hemispheric efforts to create the conditions for safe, orderly, humane and regular migration.”
Standing together with fellow leaders, Biden insisted “unlawful migration is not acceptable,” and expressed hope that other countries would join the plan.
Eric Olson, director of policy at the Seattle International Foundation, called the declaration a “useful framework” but said it would likely have limited near-term effects because it is non-binding.
Some initiatives listed by the White House were announced previously. Biden’s aides have cast the immigration plan in part to help ease U.S. labor shortages.
Jorge Castaneda, a former Mexican foreign minister, said pledges from the Americas should allow Washington to argue it had secured major commitments, a domestic “political plus” for Biden. But he added: “On substance, there’s nothing here.”
Mexico, whose border with the United States is the main point of migration – backed the declaration, despite Lopez Obrador’s no-show.
The absence from the summit of leaders of Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador – the Northern Triangle from which many migrants come – has raised doubts how effective the pledges will be. U.S. officials insisted the turnout did not prevent Washington from getting results.
The declaration encompasses commitments by an array of countries, including Mexico, Canada, Costa Rica, Belize and Ecuador. There was no mention, however, of pledges by Brazil, Latin America’s most populous nation.
The announcement did not include any U.S. pledges for additional work visas for Mexicans. That would form part Lopez Obrador’s visit with Biden next month, an official said.
Spain pledged to “double the number of labor pathways” for Hondurans, the White House said. Madrid’s temporary work program enrolls 250 Hondurans, suggesting only a small increase is envisioned.
Curbing irregular migration is a priority for Biden. Republicans, seeking to regain control of Congress in November elections, have pilloried the Democratic president for reversing Republican Trump’s restrictive immigration policies.
But migration has had to compete with Biden’s other major challenges, including high inflation, mass shootings and the war in Ukraine.
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Reporting by Humeyra Pamuk, Daina Beth Solomon, Dave Graham, Matt Spetalnick, Trevor Hunnicutt, Lisanda Paraguassu and Ted Hesson; writing by Matt Spetalnick; Editing by Jonathan Oatis, Alistair Bell and Grant McCool
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LOS ANGELES/WASHINGTON, June 7 (Reuters) – U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris has pooled $3.2 billion in corporate pledges aimed at addressing some of the economic factors driving migration from Central America, her office said on Tuesday, lending impetus to measures to be discussed at the Summit of the Americas this week.
The new commitments from companies, including Visa Inc (V.N) and the apparel company Gap Inc (GPS.N), exceed $1.9 billion, adding to $1.2 billion made in December. read more The latest round of corporate investments announced by Harris are intended to create jobs, expand access to the internet and bring more people into the formal banking system.
The pledges form a major part of President Joe Biden’s plan to address “root causes” of migration from Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador, a region known as the Northern Triangle. Curbing irregular migration is a top priority for Biden at a time when record numbers of people are trying to enter the United States at the Mexican border.
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Biden, who travels to Los Angeles on Wednesday for the U.S.-hosted summit, will also promote a new economic plan for the Western Hemisphere building on existing trade agreements, U.S. officials said. read more
Even as he grapples with pressing concerns such as mass shootings, high inflation and the Ukraine war, the Democratic president wants to use the summit to repair Latin America relations damaged under his Republican predecessor, Donald Trump, and to counter China’s growing influence in the region.
But the administration’s decision to exclude Cuba, Venezuela and Nicaragua, which prompted Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador to stay away, has threatened to overshadow Biden’s agenda. read more
However, U.S. efforts to stem migration from the Northern Triangle have been hampered by corruption, with projects likely worth millions shelved and some private sector engagement stalled. read more
Further complicating matters, the presidents of Guatemala and Honduras have signaled they will not attend the summit and will instead send other officials. It was unclear whether El Salvador’s President Nayib Bukele would attend, but the White House’s official guest list shows his foreign minister as head of the delegation.
Several thousand migrants, many from Venezuela, set off from southern Mexico on Monday on a journey to the United States timed to coincide with the summit. read more
U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris. REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque
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At least 6,000 people, according to Reuters witnesses, left the city of Tapachula, near Mexico’s border with Guatemala.
CORPORATE PLEDGES
The latest corporate pledges includes $270 million from Visa focused on bringing 6.5 million people into the formal banking system, and a $150 million pledge from Gap to increase materials sourced from the region.
The other firms span a variety of sectors, including auto-parts, agriculture, telecommunications and digital services.
A CEO summit running parallel to the leaders’ gathering could yield commitments for further investment in economically troubled Latin America, which has been hit hard by the COVID-19 pandemic and is struggling to recover.
Harris also announced an initiative with the private sector that aims to connect 1.4 million women to the financial system and train more than 500,000 women and girls in job skills.
Additionally, Harris unveiled a $50 million project called the Central American Service Corps designed to give young people in the Northern Triangle paid community service opportunities in areas such as education and violence prevention.
Despite friction over summit invitations, most leaders in the Americas plan to attend. White House officials insist the controversy will blow over and the event – the first hosted by the United States since the first such gathering in 1994 – will be a success.
But before heading to the summit, Mexican Foreign Minister Marcelo Ebrard, in a newspaper op-ed, accused the United States of being “inconsistent, if not contradictory” for refusing to invite Communist-ruled Cuba and leftist-led Venezuela and Nicaragua while engaging with non-democratic governments in other regions such as Southeast Asia. read more
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Reporting by Daina Solomon and Matt Spetalnick in Los Angeles and Ted Hesson in Washington; Additional reporting by Dave Graham in Los Angeles and Alexandra Valencia in Quito; Editing by Grant McCool
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TUXTLA GUTIERREZ, Mexico, Dec 9 (Reuters) – Fifty-four mostly Central Americans were killed on Thursday when the truck they were in flipped over in southern Mexico, in one of the worst accidents involving migrants who risk their lives to reach the United States.
The trailer broke open, spilling out people, when the truck crashed on a sharp curve outside the city of Tuxtla Gutierrez in the state of Chiapas, according to video footage of the aftermath and civil protection authorities.
Chiapas Governor Rutilio Escandon said 49 people died at the scene, and five more while receiving medical attention.
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“It took a bend, and because of the weight of us people inside, we all went with it,” said a shocked-looking Guatemalan man sitting at the scene in footage broadcast on social media.
“The trailer couldn’t handle the weight of people.”
More than 100 people were inside the trailer, authorities said. Several dozen were injured and taken to hospitals in Chiapas, which borders Guatemala. Dozens of Guatemalan migrants were named in lists of the injured published on social media.
A Reuters witness heard cries and sobs among survivors as emergency personnel rushed to the site of where the overturned truck shuddered to a halt by a highway footbridge.
Reuters images showed a white trailer on its side, with injured people splayed out on tarps on the ground. There were also rows of what appeared to be bodies wrapped in white cloth.
A video of the scene streamed on social media showed a woman holding a child wailing in her lap, both covered in blood. Another video showed a man curled up in pain inside the destroyed trailer, hardly moving as helpers pulled out bodies.
Men, women and children were among the dead, the Chiapas state government said, and President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador on Twitter expressed his sorrow at the “very painful” incident.
‘NOT THE BEST WAY’
Migrants fleeing poverty and violence in Central America typically trek through Mexico to reach the U.S. border, and sometimes cram into large trucks organized by smugglers in extremely dangerous conditions.
“This shows us that irregular migration is not the best way,” Kevin Lopez, a spokesman for Guatemala’s presidency, told Milenio television after the accident.
He did not know how many Guatemalan victims there were.
El Salvador’s foreign minister, Alexandra Hill, said her government was working to see if Salvadorans had died.
Mexico offered lodging and humanitarian visas to the survivors, and Chiapas Governor Escandon said those responsible for the accident would be held to account.
Officials in Mexico routinely come across migrants packed into trailers, including 600 people found hidden in the back of two trucks in eastern Mexico last month.
The journey north from Mexico’s border with Guatemala is perilous and expensive, and many migrants fall prey to criminal gangs en route. In January, 19 people, mostly migrants, were massacred with suspected police involvement in northern Mexico.
Record numbers of people have been arrested on the U.S.-Mexico border this year as migrants seek to capitalize on President Joe Biden’s pledge to pursue more humane immigration policies than his hardline predecessor, Donald Trump.
Mexican authorities in Chiapas have attempted to persuade migrants to not form caravans to walk thousands of miles to the U.S. border, and have begun transporting people from the southern city of Tapachula to other regions of the country.
The Biden administration has also urged migrants not to leave their homelands for the United States, and this week saw the restart of a policy initiated under Trump to send asylum seekers back to Mexico to await their court hearings.
Some critics argue that tougher policies push migrants into the hands of the human smugglers, putting their lives at risk.
“(Authorities) generate smuggled migration that generates billions of dollars in profits,” said migrant activist Ruben Figueroa.
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Reporting by Jacob Garcia; Additional reporting by Jose Torres, Lizbeth Diaz, Noe Torres and Stefanie Eschenbacher; Writing by Daina Beth Solomon; Editing by Aurora Ellis, Dave Graham and Robert Birsel
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TEGUCIGALPA, Nov 28 (Reuters) – Hondurans voting in what electoral officials said were “massive” numbers on Sunday boosted opposition hopes of ending a dozen years of National Party rule and possibly paving the way for leftist Xiomara Castro to win the presidency.
If she wins, opposition standard-bearer Castro would become the first female president in Honduras and mark the left’s return to power for the first time since her husband, former President Manuel Zelaya, was deposed in a 2009 coup. read more
As polls closed, the electoral council said more than 2.7 million voters had already cast ballots, a figure the council described as a “massive turnout” but with more votes yet to be counted.
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Council president Kelvin Aguirre said it had already surpassed total turnout four years ago.
He added that voters still in line could vote, in a contest marked by efforts from the conservative ruling party to shake off numerous corruption scandals while attacking Castro as a dangerous radical.
Long lines could be seen at many polling places across the capital. Nationwide, some 5.2 million Hondurans are eligible to vote.
For months, Castro has sought to unify the opposition to outgoing President Juan Orlando Hernandez, who has denied accusations of having ties to powerful gangs, despite an open investigation in the United States allegedly linking him to drug trafficking.
After tying up with the 2017 runner-up, a popular TV host, most polls have reinforced her front-runner status.
“We can’t stay home. This is our moment. This is the moment to kick out the dictatorship,” said Castro, mobbed by reporters just after voting in the town of Catacamas earlier in the day.
“It’s now or never.”
The candidate said she trusted that voters would report any problems they see and that international observers would also help to ensure a fair vote. read more
‘THIS IS HONDURAS’
The election is the latest political flashpoint in Central America, a major source of U.S.-bound migrants fleeing chronic unemployment and gangland violence. Honduras is among the world’s most violent countries, although homicide rates recently have dipped.
Central America is also key transit point for drug trafficking, and where concerns have grown over increasingly authoritarian governments.
The vote also has prompted diplomatic jostling between Beijing and Washington after Castro said she would open diplomatic relations with China, de-emphasizing ties with U.S.-backed Taiwan.
Castro’s main rival among 13 presidential hopefuls on the ballot is the National Party’s Nasry Asfura, a wealthy businessman and two-term mayor of the capital Tegucigalpa, who has tried to distance himself from the unpopular incumbent. read more
After casting his ballot, a measured Asfura said he would respect voters’ verdict.
“Whatever the Honduran people want in the end, I will respect that,” he said.
Some voters consulted by Reuters expressed dissatisfaction with their choices, but many others had clear favorites.
“I’m against all the corruption, poverty and drug-trafficking,” said Jose Gonzalez, 27, a mechanic who said he would vote for Castro.
Hernandez’s disputed 2017 re-election, and its ugly aftermath, looms large. Widespread reports of irregularities provoked deadly protests claiming the lives of over two dozen people, but he ultimately rode out the claims of fraud and calls for a re-vote.
Alexa Sanchez, a 22-year-old medical student, lounged on a bench just after voting while listening to music on her headphones and said she reluctantly voted for Castro.
“Honestly, it’s not like there were such good options,” she said, adding she was highly skeptical of clean vote.
“I don’t think so,” she said. “This is Honduras.”
HARD CAMPAIGN
Numerous national and international election observers monitored Sunday’s voting, including the European Union’s 68-member mission.
Zeljana Zovko, the EU’s chief observer, told a scrum of reporters around midday that her team mostly saw calm voting with high turnout, although most polling stations they visited opened late.
“The campaign has been very hard,” said Julieta Castellanos, a sociologist and former dean of Honduras’ National Autonomous University, noting that Castro has “generated big expectations.”
Castellanos said post-election violence is possible if the race is especially close, if a large number of complaints are lodged and give rise to suspicions of wide-scale fraud, or if candidates declare themselves victorious prematurely.
On Sunday afternoon, National Party leader Fernando Anduray made such a declaration, assuring an Asfura win while voting continued.
In addition to the presidential race, voters are also deciding the composition of the country’s 128-member Congress, plus officials for some 300 local governments.
In Tegucigalpa’s working-class Kennedy neighborhood, 56-year-old accountant Jose, who declined to give his surname, said he would stick with the ruling party.
“I have hope Tito Asfura can change everything,” he said, using the mayor’s nickname.
“Look, here the corruption is in all the governments.”
Preliminary results are expected around 9 p.m.
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Reporting by David Alire Garcia and Gustavo Palencia; Editing by Simon Cameron-Moore, Daniel Flynn, Lisa Shumaker, David Gregorio and Daniel Wallis
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MIZATA, El Salvador, Nov 20 (Reuters) – El Salvador plans to build the world’s first “Bitcoin City”, funded initially by bitcoin-backed bonds, President Nayib Bukele said on Saturday, doubling down on his bet to harness the crypto currency to fuel investment in the Central American country.
Speaking at an event closing a week-long promotion of bitcoin in El Salvador, Bukele said the city planned in the eastern region of La Union would get geothermal power from a volcano and not levy any taxes except for value added tax (VAT).
“Invest here and make all the money you want,” Bukele said in English, dressed all in white and wearing a reversed baseball cap, in the beach resort of Mizata. “This is a fully ecological city that works and is energized by a volcano.”
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Half of the VAT levied would be used to fund the bonds issued to build the city, and the other half would pay for services such as garbage collection, Bukele said, estimating the public infrastructure would cost around 300,000 bitcoins.
El Salvador in September became the first country in the world to adopt bitcoin as legal tender.
Although Bukele is a popular president, opinion polls show Salvadorans are skeptical about his love of bitcoin, and its bumpy introduction has fueled protests against the government.
Likening his plan to cities founded by Alexander the Great, Bukele said Bitcoin City would be circular, with an airport, residential and commercial areas, and feature a central plaza designed to look like a bitcoin symbol from the air.
“If you want bitcoin to spread over the world, we should build some Alexandrias,” said Bukele, a tech savvy 40-year-old who in September proclaimed himself “dictator” of El Salvador on Twitter in an apparent joke.
El Salvador planned to issue the initial bonds in 2022, Bukele said, suggesting it would be in 60 days time.
Samson Mow, chief strategy officer of blockchain technology provider Blockstream, told the gathering the first 10-year issue, known as the “volcano bond”, would be worth $1 billion, backed by bitcoin and carrying a coupon of 6.5%. Half of the sum would go to buying bitcoin on the market, he said. Other bonds would follow.
After a five year lock-up, El Salvador would start selling some of the bitcoin used to fund the bond to give investors an “additional coupon”, Mow said, positing that the value of the crypto currency would continue to rise robustly.
“This is going to make El Salvador the financial center of the world,” he said.
The bond would be issued on the “liquid network”, a bitcoin sidechain network. To facilitate the process, El Salvador’s government is working on a securities law, and the first license to operate an exchange would go to Bitfinex, Mow said.
Crypto exchange Bitfinex was listed as the book runner for the bond on a presentation behind Mow.
Once 10 such bonds were issued, $5 billion in bitcoin would be taken off the market for several years, Mow said. “And if you get 10 more countries to do these bonds, that’s half of bitcoin’s market cap right there.”
The “game theory” on the bonds gave first issuer El Salvador an advantage, Mow argued, saying: “If bitcoin at the five-year mark reaches $1 million, which I think it will, they will sell bitcoin in two quarters and recoup that $500 million.”
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Reporting by Nelson Renteria; Editing by Christopher Cushing and William Mallard
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SAN SALVADOR, Sept 8 (Reuters) – El Salvador’s President Nayib Bukele stepped in on Wednesday to closely manage the fraught roll-out of a payments app that underpins the nation’s adoption of bitcoin as legal tender, and called on users to report any problems on his Twitter feed.
Adopting language similar to IT departments in offices around the world, Bukele asked users to close and restart the app if a “currently under maintenance” error screen appeared.
The historic adoption of bitcoin as legal tender by the Central American country has been beset by teething problems that have contributed to a rout in the value of the digital currency globally.
Bitcoin continued to lose ground on Wednesday, trading down by more than 1.7% to about $46,000 at 1600 GMT.
That has not stopped some bullish forecasts about its future, with a new cryptocurrency research team at Standard Chartered predicting bitcoin will hit $100,000 by early next year and could be worth as much as $175,000 longer-term.
Bukele has sent a stream of Twitter messages over the past 36 hours instructing users on how to download the government-backed Chivo app which promises commission-free transactions and which his administration hopes will be adopted by the unbanked.
Overnight the president said the app, a digital wallet, was being disconnected for the second time to “improve user experience and the problems it had during the day.”
“We hope that tomorrow will be much better,” he wrote in a tweet.
Several users replied in his comments section to report ongoing installation problems.
Notwithstanding the technical issues, the app’s roll-out appears to have created a buzz in El Salvador, in part due to a government handout of $30 in bitcoin to every local user who signs up, and despite polls that show many people are wary of bitcoin’s volatility.
On the El Salvador edition of Apple’s (AAPL.O) App Store, Chivo was the No. 1 downloaded financial app on Wednesday.
Bukele earlier said only a few phone models would initially have access to the app on Alphabet’s (GOOGL.O) Google Pay to avoid a rush that could collapse the system.
Reuters could not immediately determine how many times the app had been downloaded.
Global retailers operating in El Salvador were accepting bitcoin at some stores, including McDonald’s Corp (MCD.N) and Starbucks Corp (SBUX.O), along with several local outlets.
Bukele, 40, who is doing well in opinion polls but has been accused of eroding democracy, is a heavy user of social media to govern and engage with the population.
Reporting by Nelson Renteria in San Salvador; Writing by Frank Jack Daniel; Editing by Rosalba O’Brien
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