El Salvador Swift Justice

Salvadoran President Jose Napoleon Duarte could barely contain his pleasure last week as he read reporters a letter he had sent to President Reagan. "The battle we are waging today against terrorism," he declared, "is obtaining substantial advances, which are made possible thanks to the decided backing of your government." Then Duarte broke the news: security forces had arrested three of the eleven leftist guerrillas suspected of involvement in the killing of 13 people, including four off-duty U.S. Marines, during the June 19 attack on sidewalk cafes in the Zona Rosa section of San Salvador. Duarte praised "the efficient and disinterested help" of the U.S. Government in "advising and equipping" El Salvador's two-month-old Special Investigation Commission, which supervised the inquiry that led to the arrests.

President Reagan, no less delighted by the commission's performance, sent Duarte a message congratulating him on "the speed and professionalism" of the arrests. For all the public back patting, however, at least one of the arrests hinged as much on luck as on efficient police work. According to Reynaldo Lopez Nuila, Salvadoran public security vice minister, a guerrilla suspect identified as "Jose" had been picked up in California and, together with other illegal immigrants, was deported to El Salvador, where security police arrested him. The two other suspects, Lopez Nuila said, had been arrested earlier in an upholstery shop in downtown San Salvador. Only one of those captured is accused of taking part in the massacre; the other two detainees are charged with helping to plan the operation.

The Duarte government clearly hopes that the swift arrests will convince the U.S. Congress to authorize further training assistance for the Salvadoran security forces. The capture of the suspects, Lopez Nuila said, "shows the government's resolve in investigating and resolving other cases." He said that he hoped now to be able to triple the size of the security forces, which are expecting stepped-up attacks from the five rebel factions forming the Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front.

While the arrests may influence the U.S. Congress, they have not impressed leftist critics and human rights groups, who are already complaining about such speedy attention to an incident involving U.S. Marines while thousands of cases involving rightist death-squad attacks on Salvadorans remain unsolved. More specifically, many Salvadorans want to see arrests made in the 1980 assassination of Archbishop Oscar Arnulfo Romero, who had been one of the region's most outspoken clergymen. Last week the government announced that it was reopening the investigation into Romero's murder.