Español On Friday, October 2, 2015, the University of Washington Center for Human Rights (UW CHR) filed a lawsuit against the CIA in the U.S. District Court in Seattle, alleging that the agency has failed to meet its obligations under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). The UW CHR is seeking the release of U.S. government

University of Washington Center for Human Rights sues CIA under Freedom of Information Act Lawsuit seeks release of documents relating to wartime atrocities in El Salvador Who: University of Washington Center for Human Rights and Human Rights Institute of the Central American University (IDHUCA) What: Announcement of lawsuit in bi-national press conference, followed by one-day conference

2015 marked the first year where funds from the Jennifer Caldwell Endowed Fund in Human Rights provided quarterlong support for a graduate student, Ursula Mosqueira, to conduct hands-on human rights work. Ursula, a Ph.D. student in Sociology, spent the summer and fall in El Salvador to conduct research with a group of former political prisoners

In November, 1981, during the height of the Salvadoran armed conflict, an estimated 1,200 soldiers invaded the rural northern province of Cabañas, El Salvador, to carry out a “cleansing operation.” Survivors of the invasion, however, tell a story of carnage, in which the armed forces directly targeted the unarmed civilian population, including the elderly and

(Español abajo) In recognition of the Day of the Disappeared Child in El Salvador on Sunday, March 29, UW Center for Human Rights’ Unfinished Sentences project  is proud to release two videos and a written report on two civil war-era massacres in which children were taken from their families by government forces and subsequently disappeared. In

February 19, 2015. A reflection by Nicole Einbinder, a student participant in the International Studies “Task Force” supporting the Salvadoran human rights organization Asociación Pro-Busqueda: “This whole quarter, I have focused on researching the La Quesera massacre. I dug through human rights documents and radio and newspaper clippings, tracked down important dates, and learned in general

(An excerpt from our 2013-2014 Annual Report) By Angelina Godoy As Baltasar Garzón argues in the essay that opens this Annual Report, the need for justice in El Salvador remains urgent, despite the decades that have passed since the conclusion of the civil war. The urgency and importance of this work was brought home to us

(An excerpt from our 2013-2014 Annual Report) Editorial by Baltasar Garzón Just a few weeks before the newly-elected Salvadoran president, the FMLN’s Salvador Sánchez Cerén, takes office—and following a tumultuous electoral process in which the opposition party, ARENA, went so far as to demand the nullification of the electoral results when the Supreme Electoral Tribunal refused its