El Salvador attorney for deported migrants is arrested: Rights group

The head lawyer of a human rights group helping the families of Venezuelan migrants imprisoned in El Salvador after being deported from the United States has been arrested, the organization and the government said Monday.

Activist and attorney Ruth Eleonora Lopez, a critic of President Nayib Bukele, was detained late Sunday under an order from the prosecutor's office which accused her of "embezzlement" when she worked for an electoral court a decade ago, the Cristosal of El Salvador group said in a statement.

The prosecutor's office confirmed the arrest in a post on X.

Lopez runs the rights group's corruption and justice division and is a critic of Bukele's anti-crime policy, the highlight of which is the sweeping arrests of thousands of alleged gang members.

They are being held in a huge prison tailor-built for his policy and known for torture and other abuses.

Bukele has jauntily called himself "the world's coolest dictator" and is the darling of US President Donald Trump.

"So far neither her family nor her legal team have managed to find out her whereabouts," Cristosal said.

The group helps families of Salvadorans caught up in Bukele's waves of arrests and the Venezuelans who were deported by the Trump administration in March.

Trump invoked rarely used wartime legislation to fly the Venezuelan migrants to El Salvador without any court hearing, alleging they belonged to the Tren de Aragua gang, a charge that their families and lawyers deny.