Since the first time I came to the General Assembly (see A/74/ PV.7). I have reminded members of the need to renew and reinvent ourselves. I am referring not only to the Organization or the General Assembly, but to all countries, especially those in circumstances similar to ours. Nor have I said it just to say it. but because I believe it and because in my country we are doing just that.
El Salvador, like many developing countries, has always dreamed of being great. For some countries, that dream, at some point, seemed possible. For others, like us. it was unthinkable. We did not think it was possible to even get close to fulfilling it. I even believe that no person listening to this speech ever thought that he or she could pronounce or hear the name of El Salvador as a global reference or example of something positive. Despite all the obstacles, however, we decided to take the risk. We did not accept the destiny that others had outlined for us.
Today, four years after our Government took power, no one can or dare deny that, for the first time in its 202 years of history, the smallest country on the American continent has taken the first big steps to achieve its dream of greatness. In a very short time. El Salvador has gone from being the world capital of homicides, from being literally the most dangerous country in the world, to being the safest country in Latin America. It is no longer a promise. It is a reality that Salvadorans are experiencing and that any foreigner can go and see for him or herself.
For that reason, many in the world are paying attention to what is happening in our country. Especially in Latin America, but also in the United States and elsewhere, they see what is happening in El Salvador and wonder why it does not happen in their countries. The answer is clear and simple. They must make their own decisions and reaffirm their right to use common sense, to test their own recipes, to execute their own plans and to design their own systems. No country has the right to impose its ideas or its way of doing things, especially when those do not even work in our countries. In each of the decisions we have made, we have reaffirmed our legitimate right to govern ourselves, even if that meant making mistakes.
But we were not wrong. We were successful — resoundingly successful. We therefore reaffirm not only our right to make our own decisions, but also our right to be right. There is no single recipe or formula that works equally for everyone, but I think that there is an ingredient that all recipes should include, or at least have the right to include. That ingredient is courage. You have to have the attitude, courage and determination to do what needs to be done, even when others question or criticize you.
For decades, we tried everything that others said was best for us. They made us fight a civil war for a cause foreign to our reality, because they brought the conflict between the West and the Soviet Union to our land. More than 85.000 dead and a country destroyed later, they told us that this was no longer the recipe — that now there was a new one. So we signed some false peace agreements, which had nothing to do with peace and served only to allow the two sides that fought the war to divvy up the country, as if it were loot. We tried every formula they gave us. and nothing worked.
Then, protected by foreign Powers, we handed the country over to the right. And then, also protected by external agents, we gave power to the left. This is the state they kept us in for 30 post-war years, during which there were more deaths, more poverty and more violence than in the civil war. Nobody did a thing to change the root of the system or the institutions, much less the laws.
Everything that happened during those years was done with the support, consent and imposition of those who have always called themselves great defenders of human rights and democratic institutions. Instead of giving us medicine to heal, they gave us poison. They wanted us to continue doing the same thing that was done in the past. They wanted the same people who had looted and massacred us to continue ruling or at least sharing power.
But this time, we told them no. We rejected their poison and decided to try. for the first time, our own medicine. Thank God. it worked. The first thing we did was make sure we were on the side of God and the people, because no worthwhile transformation can happen by obeying external Powers.
Secondly, we created our own method — one that was designed for our reality, created by those of us who live that reality first-hand. Then, the Salvadoran people gave us two votes of confidence. Actually, they have given us several, but those are perhaps the two most important so far. The first was when they elected me to be their President; the second, when they decided to give us. through the legislative body, the right to govern. We knew then that we had an obligation to the people to make the decisions that were necessary to fix our most urgent problem, insecurity.
The efforts we made to improve health or the economy would be of little use if they continued killing people and the judges and prosecutors let the murderers go free. It would be of little use to transform education if. from the same prisons, the gangs gave cowardly orders to kill our children and forcibly recruit our youth.
We could not just invest millions of dollars in building and improving road infrastructure if Salvadorans could not walk freely in the streets.
So we made the decision to purge the public ministry, the judicial system and the prison system. Additionally, we changed the laws to ensure that terrorists would not be released from prison again. It was at that moment that international condemnations began. Some countries, some media and some experts began a systematic attack against each of the decisions we made. People who never used their power and influence to demand security for our murdered people were suddenly opposed to our decisions to stop that massacre. Countries that never condemned the murder of 30. 40 and even 50 Salvadorans a day suddenly demanded explanations from us as to why we changed the prosecutor, the magistrates and the judges. Is it not absurd that they questioned us about that?
Who bears the responsibility for internal security policy in any country in the world? It is the responsibility of the executive branch, which acts through the State security forces and the penitentiary system, in cooperation with the public ministry and the judiciary. It was an essential condition for the plan to work that everyone worked together and aligned themselves on the same side. If we had left the Attorney General, the magistrates of the Constitutional Chamber and the judges who many protected and against whom others even issued sentences when we removed them, we would still be the world capital of murders. If we had listened to them, we would have continued to lose thousands and thousands of Salvadorans at the hands of terrorists.
Thank God we did not pay attention to them. Each of the decisions we have made brought us to this moment. Today El Salvador competes with Canada for being the safest country on the continent. Not only are we the country in Latin America with the fewest homicides per capita by far. but we have reduced all crimes to a minimum. People can now walk on streets that were long declared off-limits by the gangs. Businesses no longer pay extortion money and children can now go out and play in parks without fear of being recruited or killed. Those are things that will sound basic or everyday to many here, but in my country they did not exist.
They criticized and condemned us for each of the decisions we made at that time. Intellectuals, journalists, politicians and organizations from all over were engaged in a debate about what we were doing. Today I am here to say that debate is over. The decisions we made were correct. We are no longer the world capital of death, and we achieved that in a very short time. Today we are a security benchmark, and no one can question that. The results are in. They are irrefutable. In El Salvador, we did what was right for El Salvador.
Now that we enjoy this level of security, we have been able to open our country to the entire world. This year alone, we welcomed thousands of athletes to the Central American and Caribbean Games. We are the world epicentre of surfing. We have just signed an agreement with Google to digitize the State and services such as education and health. We have more and more tourism, internal and external. More and more people want to come and meet us and invest in El Salvador. Many Salvadorans abroad who spent years without being able to return due to insecurity are now investing in the country or have plans to return. According to a study carried out in 2022 by the International Organization for Migration, from these very United Nations, more than 60 per cent of the many Salvadorans residing in the United States intend to return to El Salvador.
There is still a long way to go to achieve it. but we are on the way to achieving our goal of reversing the mass exodus of Salvadorans, a product of the wrong policies of the past and the civil war. and to fulfilling our dream of achieving reverse migration. Let more Salvadorans return to El Salvador than leave. United Nations studies are already predicting it.
In a few months, we will host Miss Universe, an event that will once again put us in the eyes of the world and attract more tourism and more investment. In addition to all that, we are building more and better relationships with allied countries that want to support us in building our country and our dream. I am not just saying this to brag, although I do feel proud of everything we have accomplished. I am saying it because it is an example of what all countries can achieve when they begin to assert their sovereignty.
Look at us. From being recognized for violence, today we are recognized for our landscapes, for our waves and. above all. for our bravery. Today the world can see our full potential. We have a country full of wonders to offer. Those who visit us can have breakfast on the beach and surf world-class waves in a sea that has perfect water temperatures all year round. They can have lunch in the mountains, where they can try the best coffee in the world, with our superb volcanoes and beautiful lakes as a background, and dine in the capital, with all the modernity, comfort and. now. security that many first-world cities would like to have. And they can do all that in the same day.
But the best thing they will find is our friendly, hardworking people, who are always looking to do something new. When you decide to visit our country, you will realize that we Salvadorans are proud to be Salvadorans. That was not the case a few years ago. El Salvador is being reborn, because we dared to challenge ourselves and decided that nothing and no one would tell us what to do.
We are still a long way from where we want to be. but we will continue to work hard and make our own decisions, so that we can achieve the greatness we long for. We believe that the entire world also needs to be reborn, but that will be the decision of each nation. We in El Salvador are setting the example and marking a path in case someone else wants to follow it.