CISPES statement on murder of Mario González

Press Release

On Saturday, June 13, the union leader and member of the Farabundo Martí National Liberation Front (FMLN) Mario Alfredo González Paz was murdered in the city of Ilopango. According to witnesses, at 6:00 PM, after the close of a full day of partisan activities in his community, Mario was shot in the head from behind by an unknown individual while he sat in front of his home with his wife Reina Alcántara, former mayor of Ilopango and current coordinator of an FMLN base committee in San Felipe, Ilopango. The murder of Mario González is the latest in a series of recent murders of activists and human rights defenders in El Salvador that includes the transgendered activist Francela Méndez of the Alejandría Collective and the president of the Association of the War Wounded of El Salvador (ALGES), Israel Quintanilla, and his son, Carlos Zavala.

The Committee in Solidarity with the People of El Salvador (CISPES) condemns this act of horrific violence and expresses the following:

  • We extend our most heartfelt sympathies and our deepest solidarity to Mario’s family, especially his wife, and to his union brothers and sister and the FMLN membership of Ilopango.
  • We demand an efficient and exhaustive investigation by the Attorney General’s Office into the material and intellectual authors of the murder.
  • We are outraged that certain sectors are manipulating the current situation of violence in order to terrorize the Salvadoran population and wear out and destabilize the administration with obvious political motives.
  • We remain alert to ensure this case as well as the cases of Francela Méndez and Israel Quintanilla and his son don’t remain in impunity.

Mario González, ¡PRESENTE!

¡Hasta la victoria siempre!

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