Frizgeralth de Jesús Cornejo Pulgar, a Venezuelan native seeking asylum, was due to attend a standard proceeding in immigration court last month. However, instead of appearing in court, he was unexpectedly relocated to El Salvador’s notorious Terrorism Confinement Center (CECOT), along with 230 other Venezuelan immigrants. This abrupt and unnotified transfer is not an isolated incident, as under President Donald Trump’s administration, there have been multiple accounts of immigrants simply ‘vanishing’. This year, the President announced his intention to administer the most extensive deportation operation in U.S. history, following which, instances of immigrants ‘disappearing’ began to surge.
Earlier in January, another Venezuelan, Ricardo Prada Vásquez, working a delivery job and doing food pick-up from a Detroit, Michigan McDonald’s, was reportedly ‘disappeared’ to El Salvador after inadvertently straying into Canada. Despite subsequent confirmations from Immigration and Customs Enforcement of his deportation, the final destination remained undisclosed. Families of individuals like Prada Vásquez are often left without a trace when attempting to search for their loved ones in the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s online detainee locator post these incidents.
The frequency and manner of these instances sparked a discussion among academics and researchers studying state-backed enforced disappearances. Such an ‘enforced disappearance’, as per United Nations, is when state agents (or any group acting under its endorsement and aid) arrest, detain, abduct, or deprive someone of their liberty in any possible way and then refuse to disclose the status or location of the concerned individual.
Historically, crimes against international law, including enforced disappearances, did not become universally illegal under a binding document until a 2010 United Nations convention. These enforced disappearances often include political adversaries, protesters, human rights advocates, community leaders, students, and minority group members.
Enforced disappearances wield a dual purpose, serving as a tool to incite terror. Firstly, the victim is denied due process rights and is often tortured, living under constant fear and uncertainty. But the impact doesn’t stop here: it extends to their families and communities, leaving them in a state of agonizing uncertainty, oscillating between hope and despair. They are left wondering if their loved one is alive or not.
Such horrifying enforced disappearances are not new to the world. Argentina experienced mass disappearances of an estimated 30,000 people during its military dictatorship from 1976 to 1983. Chile, under the dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet, and Guatemala amid the civil war, saw over a thousand and 45,000 forced disappearances respectively.
The communist regime of North Korea has records of enforced disappearances dating back to 1950. The Assad regime in Syria is believed to have enforced the disappearance of 136,000 individuals. Other countries like Colombia and Mexico have reportedly seen hundreds of thousands of enforced disappearances, often facilitated with the silent approval or direct aid from government officials.
Venezuelan immigrants in the U.S. have been particularly targeted for deportation, often based on unsubstantiated allegations of gang involvement. The Trump administration has been steadfast in executing its deportation policy, despite existing court orders and numerous legal challenges.
A report by the United Nations in April insinuated that the lack of communication about these detentions amounted to ‘enforced disappearances’, which is a violation of international law. Detainees often had no idea of their final destination, and their families were kept in the dark about their detention or removal. The U.S. and Salvadoran officials have also been notably reticent about publishing the details or legal status of the detainees.
The method employed is viewed as distressingly similar to the tactics used in countries like Chile or Argentina during the 1970s, with one key difference – families remain hopeful, if not certain, that their relatives are still alive. There is a palpable fear among immigrants of the possibility of being sent to an infamous Salvadoran jail where sunlight is a luxury.
Such abrupt detentions and deportations exert a profound impact far beyond the individuals affected. This fosters an environment of fear and uncertainty not just among undocumented individuals, but also those legally present in the United States. The fear of being swept up in one of these raids, disappearing into the prison system, and being deported to a country where they have no ties, is immense.
The most effective countermeasure to these disturbing practices, many believe, is to ensure these incidents do not go unnoticed. By drawing attention to each individual case, whether through public protests, online petitions, or social media, the power lies with Americans to ensure that those disappeared by the government remain in public view and part of the ongoing conversation. This visibility can serve as a potent opposition to these enforced disappearances.