Security & Strategic Review - September 2015 (ISSN 1741-4202)

The Salvadorean street gangs have responded to the government’s decision to start trying them as terrorists [SSR-15-08] with a sharp increase in homicides, to which the national police (PNC) responded with an escalation of confrontations with the maras. The government has interpreted this as another attempt by the gangs to force the authorities to reverse their policy of confining their leaders to maximum security prisons. One feature in the new wave of violence was a string of attacks with explosives that have been attributed to the maras.