El Salvador Security

Juana Cruz shyly lowered her eyes and in an almost inaudible voice said: "I would like to come home early this week. I want to make sure I am home to vote." About 100 miles to the east, in La Pena, Vertila Martin said, "I won't vote, and neither will my husband." The contrasting attitudes of these two, both poor women trying to survive in a country drained by civil war and submerged in economic disaster, mirror the conflicts of an election in which voting can be a life-threatening act.

Juana Cruz shyly lowered her eyes and in an almost inaudible voice said: "I would like to come home early this week. I want to make sure I am home to vote." About 100 miles to the east, in La Pena, Vertila Martin said, "I won't vote, and neither will my husband." The contrasting attitudes of these two, both poor women trying to survive in a country drained by civil war and submerged in economic disaster, mirror the conflicts of an election in which voting can be a life-threatening act.

A state of siege in effect in El Salvador since 1980 expired when the conservative minority in the National Assembly refused to act on a bill to renew the restrictions. Gen. Adolfo Blandon, head of the military chiefs of staff, in a reference to leftist guerrillas, warned that national security is in danger as a result. Passage of the bill requires a two-thirds majority vote.

A state of siege in effect in El Salvador since 1980 expired when the conservative minority in the National Assembly refused to act on a bill to renew the restrictions. Gen. Adolfo Blandon, head of the military chiefs of staff, in a reference to leftist guerrillas, warned that national security is in danger as a result. Passage of the bill requires a two-thirds majority vote.

Honduras tightened security at foreign embassies and declared a terror alert after receiving information that Al Qaeda was trying to recruit Hondurans to attack embassies of the U.S., Britain, Spain and El Salvador. Security Minister Oscar Alvarez said some Hondurans had been offered money to carry out attacks and others had been approached on ideological grounds. Honduras has a tiny Islamic community.

Over the last decade U.S. taxpayers have sent more than $4.5 billion to El Salvador's military to help it fight a bloody war against leftist guerrillas. With each new aid appropriation U.S. policy-makers shake their heads over the lack of progress toward peace and the frequently heinous behavior of El Salvador's security forces. But the aid continues to flow, so far to no good end. That must change.

The former chief of El Salvador's intelligence agency charged Thursday that a Nicaraguan rebel officer trained some of his country's rightist "death squads" and helped organize the 1980 assassination of Salvadoran Archbishop Oscar Arnulfo Romero. The Salvadoran, Col. Roberto Santivanez, identified the Nicaraguan as Col. Ricardo Lau, who until recently was chief of intelligence for the Nicaraguan Democratic Force, a U.S.-backed rebel group.