Two arrested for killing Dutch journalist in El Salvador in 1982

A memorial to the murdered journalist. Photo: Dijk, Hans van/Anefo via Wikimedia Commons

El Salvadoran authorities have arrested two people in connection with the 1982 murder of four Dutch journalists and have asked the United States to extradite a third person, TV news program Zembla reported.

Koos Koster, Jan Kuiper, Joop Willemsen, and Hans ter Laag traveled to El Salvador in 1982 to report a bloody civil war in which they were killed by government soldiers while trying to enter guerrilla-controlled areas. rice field.

The two people currently under arrest are former Defense Minister Guillermo Garcia and then-special police chief Francisco Antonio Morán, Zembra said. Moran lived in the United States until 2016, when he was deported for his complicity in human rights abuses in El Salvador.

The two will appear in court in Chalatenago on Monday, Zembra said.

In 2018, Zembla revealed that Mario Reys Mena, the third man allegedly ordered to kill the four, also lived in the United States. El Salvador is now seeking his extradition, Zembra said Sunday.

The official view at the time was that four journalists working for the now-defunct broadcaster Ikon were killed during a shootout between guerrilla fighters and the military.

However, a 1993 UN investigation found that the murder was premeditated and that the four were ambushed en route to guerrilla territory.

Until five years ago, an amnesty was available and no legal action could be taken against soldiers, but that law was repealed in 2016.