| Country: | El Salvador |
| Details of Formation: | Village based civil patrols were set up by the Salvadorian army to inform on guerrilla movements in the countryside during the civil war from 1980-1992. Civilians were recruited, in some cases by means of coercion, and sometimes armed by the military. Many had been former members of Orden, a paramilitary network disbanded after the 1979 coup that brought the civil-military junta to power. |
| Details of Termination: | The civil defence patrols were disbanded when a peace deal was signed with rebels in January 1992. Former members of the patrol were not included as beneficiaries in the peace accords adn later demanded compensation from the government for their role in helping the army during the conflict. |
| Purpose: | The Civil Defence Patrols were mainly intended to act in place of the military in order to provide security in places where the army was not present, protecting the local population from rebel groups. |
| Organisation: | The Civil Defence Patrols were under the general command of the Army and the Defence Ministry. Based on the information available, it is unclear how the military exercised control after a particular local group was formed. |
| Weapons and Training: | According to varying accounts by news reports, the Civil Defence Patrols were provided with either poor or no training by the government. The government supplied its members with weapons such as automatic rifles, as reported by one news source. |
| Size: | -- |
| Reason for Membership: | It is not clear whether or not members were paid. One news source states that members were paid (around $1 a day) while another one reports that they were only paid rarely but were allowed to collect money from the local population. |
| Treatment of Civilians: | The Civil Defence Patrols were responsible for killings, massacres, assassinations, disappearances and torture against civilians and political officials. One massacre lead to protests by the local population against the government and military. |
| Other Information: | The civil defence groups were frequently linked to human rights abuses and proved increasingly unpopular in the countryside as the war went on. Efforts to expand the units were unsuccessful in the late 80s, despite the units forming a key aspect of the US-backed government's strategy to crush the leftist insurgency in El Salvador. An attempt by the ruling party Arena in 1989 to set up similar 'patriotic civil defence patrols' in the capital was halted after the Catholic Church protested and the groups were subsequently disbanded. |
| References: | Amnesty International. 2001. “El Salvador: Peace can only be achieved with justice” AI index: AMR 29/001/2001. |