The arrest of five environmental activists fighting water pollution and mining in El Salvador is drawing international criticism following questionable developments in court proceedings that suggest the case against them is politically motivated.

The activists were arrested in January in connection to an alleged 1989 kidnapping and murder during the country’s civil war. But a lack of evidence in the case has led to calls for their release and a closer look at the steps the government is taking to renew a defunct mining sector.

“We are concerned these arrests are politically motivated and intended to silence the overwhelming opposition to mining in the country. We also have concerns that these men have been denied their basic right to due process,” 17 U.S. members of Congress said in a letter earlier this month.

Known locally as “water defenders,” the five men helped lead a campaign to ban metals mining in 2017 and protect El Salvador’s primary source of clean water, the Lempa River Basin. The countrywide ban was the first of its kind anywhere in the world and was celebrated as a landmark step for environmental policy.

But in recent years, President Nayib Bukele’s government has taken some steps that suggest it’s reconsidering its position on mining. It created a government agency to regulate the energy and mining industries and joined an intergovernmental forum that helps “advance best practices” for the mining sector. READ THE FULL ARTICLE