The Attorney General’s Office of El Salvador (FGR) has seized a property, three vehicles and has immobilized two bank accounts of former president Salvador Sánchez Cerén valued at US$1,275,000 as part of the process opened against the former president for money laundering.
The Prosecutor’s Office accuses Sánchez Cerén of the crimes of Money and Asset Laundering and Embezzlement along with 16 former employees of the presidential house and private individuals, who between 2016 and 2019 illegally used public funds, according to the Salvadoran digital media El Metropolitano Digital.
These assets are also registered in the name of William Oswaldo Vaquero León, Sánchez Cerén’s son-in-law. With this proceeding, the process to recover the funds that were illegally stolen from the State begins, according to the Attorney General’s Office.
After learning of this decision, Sánchez Cerén has denounced that he is the victim of political persecution. «In view of the news originated by the FGR announcing the seizure of real estate of my property and bank accounts, I make the following statement: I do not own personal property, real estate or vehicles of my property,» he said in a statement.
Sanchez Cerén, who resides in Nicaragua, indicated in his statement that the only thing that the FGR has frozen «is the bank account where my pension was deposited, so I am unable to access those resources, depriving me of the means of my maintenance». For this reason, he has urged the FGR to present evidence or to cease the acts of defamation against him.
«If there is something I can be proud of, it is that I lack material wealth, as confirmed by the Probity Section of the Supreme Court of Justice, therefore, I demand clarifications and an end to the political persecution against me», he reiterated.
