Rights groups are increasingly worried that El Salvador’s notorious CECOT prison is becoming a “black hole” for the United States to rid itself of expelled migrants or other unwanted people with no legal consequences.A US senator who traveled to the Central American country Wednesday to try and retrieve a man wrongly deported and locked up there was sent away without even being able to speak to him.The man, Salvadoran Kilmar Abrego Garcia, is one of nearly 300 migrants — mostly Venezuelans — the Donald Trump administration has sent to El Salvador since January without any kind of court hearing.Once there, they were locked up in the infamously harsh Terrorism Confinement Center built to house gangsters rounded up in President Nayib Bukele’s iron-fisted anti-crime drive.Observers say most of the migrants had committed no crime, and many had enjoyed asylum status in the United States.None have been heard from since they were sent to El Salvador, where they are now in legal limbo.Human Rights Watch, in a report last week, said El Salvador and the United States have subjected dozens of people to “enforced disappearances and arbitrary detention.”At the CECOT, they are held incommunicado, not allowed even contact with lawyers.”What they are trying to create here is a Guantanamo on steroids… a black hole where there is no legal protection for the people there,” Juan Pappier, HRW’s America’s deputy director, told AFP, referring to the US prison for terror suspects at a military base in Cuba. It is synonymous with torture and other abuses.- ‘Illegally abducted’ -The deportation of Abrego Garcia in particular has sparked an outcry and set off a legal crisis.Trump officials have claimed he is an illegal migrant, a gang member and involved in human trafficking. He has never been convicted of any crime and had been granted a protected status that should have barred his deportation to El Salvador.A federal judge, backed by the Supreme Court, has ordered Abrego Garcia’s return, but the Trump administration contends he is now solely in Salvadoran custody.Bukele, who has proudly adopted the moniker of “world’s coolest dictator,” has said he does not have the power to send the man back.Hoping to heap political pressure on the Trump administration, Maryland Senator Chris Van Hollen visited El Salvador on Wednesday to plead the case of Abrego Garcia, who he said was illegally abducted from the United States.Van Hollen met Vice President Felix Ulloa, who denied him all access to the man.”His answer was that the Trump administration is paying El Salvador, the government of El Salvador, to keep him at CECOT,” the senator said of the response he got from Ulloa.Washington and San Salvador have shrugged off criticism of their collaboration, and Trump on Monday warmly thanked Bukele for “helping us out” with his administration’s mass deportation drive.El Salvador is receiving $6 million to house the migrants, and Bukele left Monday’s meeting with an agreement for his country to join the US Global Entry program, which allows expedited visa entry.”Bukele’s cooperation with President Trump’s agenda, including disappearing people overseas… and into prisons notorious for abuse, is unprecedented, rights-violating and extreme,” Noah Bullock of Central American rights group Cristosal said on X.- 350 deaths -AFP interviewed several relatives of Venezuelans detained in El Salvador, all of whom insisted their loved ones were not criminals.Alexis de Hernandez, mother of 31-year-old Andry Hernandez Romero, said her son was rounded up “just for having tattoos” — a common complaint in this drama.US officials have claimed the markings indicate loyalty to Venezuela’s Tren de Aragua gang, but experts note that the group — unlike Salvadoran gangs — does not use tattoos for clan identification. According to Cristosal, nearly half of the CECOT detainees it has been able to trace had asylum status in the United States or were applying for asylum, “which should protect them from deportation.”Trump has encouraged Bukele to build more jails and said Tuesday he would “love” to start also sending American citizens who commit violent crimes to the CECOT.The Washington-based WOLA advocacy group warned in a commentary published Monday “that thousands of citizens are languishing in Et Salvador’s abusive prison system” and “at least 350 people have died in custody as a result of these conditions.””Corruption and lack of transparency (in El Salvador) should be of bipartisan concern” for the United States, it argued. “The US must not only monitor how its financial assistance is being used, but also examine whether it is inadvertently supporting a government that systematically withholds information and evades accountability.”

The Trump administration aims to remove degradation of habitat from its definition of “harm” to endangered species, proposing Wednesday a rule change that would open the door to human activity in ecologically sensitive environments.The US Fish and Wildlife Service and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said  the definition of “harm” in the Endangered Species Act should exclude “actions that impair the habitat of protected species.”Environmental groups said the rule change would allow timber, oil and mining activity, as well as other activities by individuals and the government, to destroy the habitats of endangered animals.”For 50 years, the ESA has saved numerous species — including iconic American species like bald eagles, gray wolves, Florida manatees, and humpback whales — from extinction,” environmental law organization Earthjustice said.”One key to this success has been its definition of harm, which recognizes the common-sense concept that destroying a forest, beach, river, or wetland that a species relies on for survival constitutes harm to that species,” it said, adding that the group was prepared to challenge the proposal in court.”There’s just no way to protect animals and plants from extinction without protecting the places they live, yet the Trump administration is opening the flood gates to immeasurable habitat destruction,” said Noah Greenwald, codirector of endangered species at the Center for Biological Diversity. “Without a prohibition on habitat destruction, spotted owls, sea turtles, salmon and so many more imperiled animals won’t stand a chance,” said Greenwald. “Trump is trying to drive a knife through the heart of the Endangered Species Act.”The proposal will now be open to public comment for 30 days.Since its 1973 enactment, the Endangered Species Act has been credited with saving iconic species such as the gray wolf, bald eagle and grizzly bear from extinction.President Donald Trump ran on a platform that promised to roll back environmental regulations that crimp economic development.In February, Interior Secretary Doug Burgum issued a call for proposals to unleash US energy, potentially opening up fragile landscapes from the Arctic to the Grand Canyon and even national monuments for exploitation.Days later, Trump said his administration aimed to cut about 65 percent of staff at the Environmental Protection Agency.

Russian President Vladimir Putin praised Elon Musk on Wednesday, telling university students he was a pioneer comparable to legendary Soviet rocket engineer Sergei Korolev.The comments came as Russia and the United States forged closer ties under President Donald Trump’s administration, of which billionaire SpaceX founder Musk is a key figure.”You know, there’s a man — he lives in the States — Musk, who, you could say, raves about Mars,” Putin told students on a visit to Bauman University, a Moscow college that specialises in science and engineering.”These are the kind of people who don’t often appear in the human population, charged-up with a certain idea.””If it seems incredible even today, such ideas often come to fruition after a while. Just like the ideas of Korolev, our pioneers, came about in due time,” Putin added.Korolev is considered the father of the Soviet space programme, developing the first satellite Sputnik as well as Vostok 1, which carried first cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin into orbit in 1961.Musk, the world’s richest man and Trump’s most powerful advisor, is the head of SpaceX — a US company that launches rockets for NASA and owns the Starlink satellite internet network.Musk has been a frequent critic of Ukraine, which is currently battling a three-year Russian offensive.The billionaire accused Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky last month of wanting a “forever war”, and in February said Kyiv had gone “too far” in the conflict.

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio will meet French leaders in Paris on Thursday to discuss the war in Ukraine, his office said, amid flailing efforts to persuade Russia to agree to a ceasefire.Rubio and US presidential envoy Steve Witkoff would also discuss tensions over Iran’s nuclear programme and Middle East trouble spots, in talks with France’s President Emmanuel Macron and Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot, according to a French diplomatic source.No specific proposals for the talks have been made public, but Witkoff met with Russian President Vladimir Putin last week in a bid to press US President Donald Trump’s efforts for a ceasefire.Trump pledged before taking office that he would quickly end the war raging since Russia’s February 2022 invasion of neighbouring Ukraine, and he has voiced frustration at Moscow’s tactics.Witkoff said this week, however, after his third meeting with Putin, that he still sees a peace deal “emerging”.Rubio will be on his third trip to Europe since becoming the top US diplomat, having already attended the Munich Security Conference and a NATO meeting in February and March.For Europe, Ukraine has become more critical following Russia’s recent missile strikes on two Ukrainian cities that left dozens of civilians dead. Barrot said on Wednesday that Putin “has again showed that his cruelty is limitless and that he has no intention of starting a ceasefire” as proposed by the United States and Ukraine last month.France, Britain and Germany were surprised by Trump opening talks on improving ties with Russia, but have sought a coordinated European response to protecting Ukraine, during the conflict and in any ceasefire.Britain and France have proposed a mainly European “reassurance” force prepared to go to Ukraine if a ceasefire starts. However, many European leaders say it would need US support.The State Department said only that Rubio and Witkoff would meet European officials to discuss Trump’s efforts to “advance” the goal of stopping the Ukraine war.A French diplomatic source said Rubio and Barrot would discuss “the war in Ukraine, the situation in the Middle East and the Iranian nuclear file”.The United States and Iran are to hold a second round of indirect talks on Iran’s nuclear programme in Rome on Saturday.The talks have become more important after Rafael Grossi, head of the United Nations’ nuclear watchdog, warned on Wednesday that Iran was “not far” from possessing a nuclear bomb.Talks to end the Gaza war have also stalled, with Israel blocking humanitarian aid from entering the Palestinian territory. The UN says Gaza now faces its worst humanitarian crisis since the start of the war in October 2023, after the Hamas attacks.Separately, French Defence Minister Sebastien Lecornu will travel to Washington on Thursday.He was set to meet with US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, for talks also dominated by Ukraine, Iran and Gaza.Lecornu was also expected to meet with National Intelligence director Tulsi Gabbard and Keith Kellogg, Trump’s Ukraine envoy.burs/tw/rjm