San Salvador, El Salvador
The President of El Salvador, Nayib Bukele, declined to meet with the United States Special Envoy for the Northern Triangle, Ricardo Zuniga, according to statements made by an official from that country’s embassy to local Salvadoran media.
The website elsalvador.com, associated with Today’s diary, noted in a post that the Head of Public Affairs at the US Embassy, Matt BolandHe told the media that “Special Envoy Zúñiga expected to meet with President Bukele during his visit to El Salvador and that a meeting was requested.”
However, according to this medium, “Boland added that they hope that another opportunity will arise in the future.”
At a press conference in Washington just hours earlier, US State Department spokesman Ned Price declined to clarify whether Zúñiga would meet Bukele during his two-day visit.
“We don’t have any meeting to report to you, but if that changes, we’ll be happy to,” said Price alone.
The only senior official of the Bukele government that Zúñiga met was the Secretary of State Alexandra Hill, as announced on Twitter by the North American country’s chargé d’affaires, Brendan O’Brien.
“We all agree that the economic and security situation needs to be improved so that Salvadorans do not feel obligated to undertake #UnViajeEnVano in search of opportunities,” the diplomat said.
We also “discussed how to further strengthen our excellent bilateral cooperation,” he added.
Neither President Bukele nor Chancellor Hill have made reference to Zúñiga’s visit on their social networks.
On Tuesday, Zúñiga said in Guatemala that the United States wants that country to create “preconditions” for its citizens, such as the rule of law, employment, health and education, to undermine irregular migration.
Before departing for Salvadoran territory, where you will continue and end your visit to the region without reaching HondurasZúñiga stressed that these new conditions that both states are looking for are necessary “so that Guatemalans and other people from Central America and Mexico do not have to make their futures in the United States.”
The Northern Triangle of Central America, which consists of Guatemala, El Salvador and Honduras, is one of the poorest and most violent regions in the world according to various studies by international organizations.
Every year more than 500,000 people from these three countries try to migrate illegally to the United States in search of better living conditions, including thousands of minors.