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When Guadalupe Mejía began looking for her husband – a community leader forcibly disappeared by the Armed Forces of El Salvador in 1977 – Óscar Romero encouraged her to speak out despite the danger.
"Unite and that is how you can find your loved ones," recalls the Archbishop of San Salvador, telling her about her experiences, as well as other bereaved women. "He supported us and always stood by us in everything we did."
Romero acquired powerful enemies for denouncing the military death squads and defending the rights of the poor – and on March 24, 1980, he was shot dead as he celebrated Mass, marking the beginning of the civil war that had been raging in the country for 12 years.
On Sunday, Romero officially becomes a saint.
While Salvadorans celebrate his canonization, pride and joy are tempered by anger and pain: 75,000 people were killed during the civil war, the majority at the hands of the Salvadoran army backed by the United States.
An amnesty law promulgated after the end of the conflict guaranteed impunity for war crimes and was only quashed in 2016. Prosecution has progressed slowly and no convictions have occurred. was pronounced by a Salvadoran court.
"We still have not seen justice in any way," said María Irma Orellana, 64, whose sisters and two brothers were killed during the civil war. "We still feel this lack of justice in so many cases."
The murder of Romero is no different: no one has ever been convicted of conspiracy or murder – nor the massacre when soldiers shot at the crowd at his funeral, killing dozens of people. mourning.
A UN truth commission concluded that Roberto d'Aubuisson – an army officer and founder of the right-wing arena party – was responsible for the assassination. D'Aubuisson, who died of cancer in 1992, has never been tried by a court.
Today, Romero's spectacled face is omnipresent, given postage stamps and posters across San Salvador.
But in life, he was a deeply divisive character, venerated by the wealthy Salvadorians as a "guerrilla in cassock" – and after his death, Romero strongly resisted the canonization of Romero, especially because of his association with the left release. theological movement.
Most right-wing politicians now publicly demonstrate their support for Romero's canonization.
The presidential candidate of the Arena, Carlos Calleja, has promised to support "a real search for the truth" in this case. But the party still denies that its founder was involved and celebrated in August what would have been Aubuisson's 75th birthday.
The Supreme Court declared the amnesty law unconstitutional in 2016 and the following year, the Human Rights Association María Julia Hernández managed to ensure that the case of Romero's murder was reopened.
"To seek the object of justice in the case of Archbishop Romero is also to honor all the victims he has defended," said Ovidio Mauricio García, director of the association. "His case is the most emblematic because, behind his case, there are still more victims and people murdered, missing and tortured."
Although the civil war ended in 1992, peace never returned to El Salvador. US immigration policy has helped California-trained street gangs to establish in the country. Today, gang warfare, judicial impunity and political corruption have helped to make it one of the most violent places on the planet.
Mejía is still waiting for justice in the case of the disappearance of her husband – as in the case of Orellana in the case of the murder of her brothers and sisters.
"He died, but he left us his legacy," said Mejía. "So that we can continue to fight and win one day what we seek – peace, justice and freedom."
Sofía Hernández, who went to Rome to celebrate the canonization of Romero, said that no one had yet been charged – much less prosecuted – for the disappearance of his daughter, his two brothers and sisters and his four nephews.
"We are many victims and we want peace, justice and reparations," she said on the phone from Rome. "We will continue to fight for our demands so that victims' requests are accepted. That's what Romero taught us. "
