The implementation of security plans in El Salvador continues to leave unprecedented results, as February of this year has become the safest month in the country’s history with an annual homicide rate of 0.8 per 100,000 inhabitants.
These conditions position the country as the safest among nations in the entire Western Hemisphere, as announced by the President of the Republic, Nayib Bukele.
“February 2024 closes becoming the safest month in the entire history of our country,” the president published and added: “with an annualized rate of 0.8 homicides per 100,000 inhabitants; less than half of Canada and by far the safest country in the entire Western Hemisphere.
El Salvador is even safer than the ten cities in the United States with the highest crime rate, as stated in a report published by the personal finance website WalletHub on the cities with the greatest homicide rate problems in 2023.
The report highlights that the country has the lowest homicide rate than Washington; Memphis, Tennessee; Detroit, Michigan; Milwaukee, Wisconsin; Atlanta, Georgia; Baltimore, Maryland; Jacksonville, Florida; Kansas City, Missouri; Dallas, Texas, and Seattle, Washington.
While homicidal violence became unstoppable in these cities, El Salvador fell off the list of the most violent nations in the world and went from a murder rate of 53.31 per 100,000 inhabitants in 2018 to being reduced to 2.4 in 2023 and 0.8 at this time , the lowest in decades. If this trend continues, the country could further reduce this rate by the end of this year.
Consequently, this also coincides with the fact that last February had 24 days without homicides and equaled the number of days without crimes with which January ended.
Currently, both months have the record of the safest in the history of the country, with the singularity that during all of January nine murders were committed, while in February 6 were reported. All the cases did not have to do with gang attacks.
Regarding the homicides, the Minister of Justice and Security, Gustavo Villatoro, highlighted that thanks to the prompt intervention of the National Civil Police (PNC), the criminals who perpetrated these murders were located and captured.
The above means that, thanks to the police’s efforts to clarify these crimes, the record of impunity was reduced to 0% in February.
On repeated occasions, Minister Villatoro has highlighted this achievement as important under this administration if we take into consideration that, in 2015, during the government of the fugitive Salvador Sánchez Cerén, impunity rose to 97%, that is, for every 100 homicides committed in In the country, only in three cases were the murderers imprisoned.
AVERAGE OF DAILY HOMICIDES WAS REDUCED TO 0.25
El Salvador had a daily average of 18.2 homicides at the end of 2015, considered the bloodiest year because 6,656 Salvadorans were murdered during the second FMLN government, under the management of Sánchez Cerén.
So far in 2024, the daily average of murders has been reduced to 0.25, and thanks to the climate of tranquility that the population enjoys, the country has positioned itself as a tourist and investment destination as it is the safest in Latin America.
According to police data, last January closed with a daily average of 0.29 murders, while February did so with 0.21; The violent deaths reported for each of the months occurred in circumstances of intolerance and passion, the authorities indicated.
The authorities attribute the decrease in murders as an effective result of the implementation of the Territorial Control Plan and the emergency regime, measures that have allowed the dismantling of gang structures and the capture of more than 76,000 of their members.
With these actions, the authorities managed to recover the territories dominated by the gangs; The emergency regime provided legal tools to capture and then prosecute criminals in court. It was also possible to close the financing valves with the seizure of drugs, weapons, vehicles, cell phones, etc.