By Raul Cortes
(Reuters) – The U.S. State Department added nearly 40 people from El Salvador, Honduras, Guatemala and Nicaragua, including former presidents and judges, to a list published on Wednesday of “corrupt and undemocratic actors.”
Two former Salvadoran presidents – Mauricio Funes, who served from 2009 to 2014, and his successor Salvador Sanchez, whom Washington links to corruption, money laundering and embezzlement of public funds – were added to the list.
Funes and Sanchez, who both faced legal proceedings in El Salvador, now live in Nicaragua and cannot be extradited after receiving citizenship from the government of President Daniel Ortega.
“Corruption, a root cause of irregular migration, harms our national security,” said Brian Nichols, assistant secretary of state for Western Hemisphere affairs, as he presented the report.
Guatemalan targets include Fredy Orellana, the judge who ordered the suspension of an anti-graft party after its presidential candidate, Bernardo Arevalo, garnered enough votes to take part in an Aug. 20 presidential run-off.
The so-called Engel list also features judges and prosecutors accused of persecuting journalists in Guatemala.
Guatemala’s government meanwhile rejected the accusations on Wednesday, labeling the report “used by the United States to impose its jurisdiction on people abroad, as despicable.”
It includes ex-officials from the government of former Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernandez, who was extradited to the United States over drug trafficking links.
Politicians from Honduras’ opposition Liberal Party also appear, including Liberal leader Yani Rosenthal, previously convicted of money laundering in the United States. Rosenthal responded in a tweet that he “categorically rejects the unfounded accusations made in the list.”
The Nicaraguan section includes all of the country’s parliamentary leaders, barring its president, who Washington has already sanctioned, and several judges and directors of Nicaragua’s money laundering watchdog.
(Reporting by Raul Cortes in Mexico City, Sofia Menchu in Guatemala City, Gustavo Palencia in Tegucigalpa and Nelson Renteria in San Salvador; Writing by Sarah Morland; Editing by Matthew Lewis)
