2,000 prisoners suspected of being members of the MS-13 and 18th Street gangs arrive at El Salvador's new 'mega-prison'

• 2,000 suspected gang members have been moved to a new mega-prison in El Salvador.
• President Nayib Bukele said on Twitter the men will live in the prison for "decades."

Two thousand suspected violent gang members have been moved to a new "mega-prison" in El Salvador.

President Nayib Bukele announced the move on Twitter, saying that the "first" of thousands of inmates had been transferred to the Center for the Confinement of Terrorism.

"This will be their new house, where they will live for decades, mixed up, unable to do any more harm to the population," he wrote.

Construction on the "mega-prison," which can hold up to 40,000 inmates, only finished at the end of January. If the prison reaches the stated total capacity, it will be the biggest in the world. The largest prison in the world is the Silivri Penitentiaries Campus in Turkey, which holds more than 22,000 inmates, according to the Guinness World Records.

According to The Telegraph, the vast prison is surrounded by a 36ft high concrete wall and electric fences.

The newspaper writes that every cell has an iron sheet cabin, with no mattress, that can sleep up to 80 people.

The move is part of a huge push to crack down on gang violence and murders in the country, which is among the worst in the world. In March 2022, President Bukele declared a "state of exception," suspending rights to freedom of expression, association, and due process.

Over 64,000 suspected gang members have been arrested since this state of emergency was announced, Reuters reports.

The anti-gang push remains widely popular with Salvadorans, said Reuters.

Two notorious gangs dominate El Salvador. The MS-13 and their rivals, the 18th Street gang. Both originated from Los Angeles and spread through Central America.

The Human Rights Watch has criticized the state of emergency. Its Americas director Juanita Goebertus said: "To put an end to gang violence and human rights violations, El Salvador's government should replace the state of emergency with an effective and rights-respective security policy that grants Salvadorans the safety they so dearly deserve."

In 2020 the mistreatment of suspected gang members in El Salvador made headlines when photos were released of barely clothed prisoners stacked together as punishment for a spate of violence.