CAT/C/35/D/237/2003
Page 4
Factual background
2.1 In 1987, the complainant joined a committee for the unemployed (Codydes) and the
Salvadorian Women’s Movement (MSM) in El Salvador, which protested against certain
government policies. As a result of the political repression against social activists, the
complainant joined the guerrilla movement Frente Farabundo Martí para la Liberación
Nacional (FMLN), and became an active comrade leading the women’s division of eastern
San Salvador.
2.2. On 11 November 1989, the complainant was apprehended by police agents and
violently pushed into a pick-up. She was taken to a police facility where she was allegedly
beaten and forced to take off her clothes before being subjected to an interrogation about the
activities of FMLN’s members. When she refused to answer the questions, the officers put a
plastic bag containing lime over her head. She was subjected to this type of interrogation
several times. She was allegedly abused, repeatedly beaten and given electric shocks. She
remained in detention for 40 days, during which she was not taken before a judge or visited
by a doctor. She was released on 19 December 1989, thanks to ICRC intervention.
2.3 After her release, the complainant and her two children went into hiding. In 1990, in the
midst of an FMLN campaign for municipal elections, a vehicle with tainted windows
attempted to run her over. She did not file a complaint with the police, but the FMLN
publicly denounced the event. Her husband was threatened, apparently in connection with his
activities as a journalist. The complainant also received death threats over the telephone. Her
husband applied for asylum for the whole family at the Swedish embassy. While their
application was still pending, on 22 June 1991, the complainant was again intercepted by a
vehicle of the security forces, forced to board the car and taken to the police headquarters
where she was interrogated, beaten, almost asphyxiated with a plastic bag containing lime,
and administered electric shocks to her body, including her vagina. She was released on 31
July 1991. She did not have access to a lawyer nor was she brought before a judge. For fear
of reprisal, the complainant did not report the latter incident to the police, to any human rights
organization or to the courts. She and her family went into hiding and attempted to contact
the Swedish embassy. Meanwhile, their application for asylum had been discontinued.
2.4 In 1992, after the Government and the FMLN had signed the Peace Accords, the
complainant was actively involved in the constitution of the new political party FMLN. She
gave testimony of the torture she had experienced to the UN-led Truth Commission which
investigated human rights violations that had occurred during the internal armed conflict in El
Salvador. She was disappointed with the amnesty law passed by the right-wing government
of Mr. Alfredo Cristiani immediately after the release of the Commission’s report, granting a
general pardon to members of the military and the security forces that had allegedly been
involved in human rights violations. In 1994, she learned that all the files concerning the
activities of FMLN members had been transferred to the Military. One of her torturers was
admitted to the new police force created in accordance with the Peace Accords. She was
unable to get a job because official records commonly required in employment applications
portrayed her as having a “subversive background”. In 1996, she participated as a candidate
in the municipal elections of San Salvador. She submits that, by that year, almost 30 FMLN
members had been killed by death squads. The death squads are said to be supported by rightwing persons with close ties to the government.