Sansalvador - Conservative businessman Nayib Bukele took office Saturday as president of El Salvador, tasked with turning around grinding poverty and rampant gang violence that are sending thousands fleeing to the United States.

Chalatenango - Some 1,700 imprisoned gang members in El Salvador claiming to be turning around their lives in a rehabilitation program have a message for US President Donald Trump: they're neither "terrorists" nor "animals.

Sansalvador - Incoming El Salvador president Nayib Bukele will not invite regional counterparts Nicolas Maduro of Venezuela, Daniel Ortega of Nicaragua and Honduras' Juan Orlando Hernandez to his June 1 inauguration, a top aide said Tuesday.

Sansalvador - Salvadoran police said Monday they had struck a "heavy blow" against the Central American country's violent MS-13 gang, arresting 117 members for a raft of crimes from murder to extortion.

Ilopango - Three women serving 30-year sentences for falling foul of El Salvador's severe anti-abortion laws walked free from prison Thursday after the Central American country's Supreme Court ordered their release.

Sansalvador - A Salvadoran court on Friday freed Evelyn Hernandez, who was sentenced to 30 years in prison after she gave birth to a stillborn baby at home.

Sansalvador - Nayib Bukele, former San Salvador mayor, was on Sunday elected president of El Salvador -- crushing a two-party system in place since civil war ended in 1992.

Sansalvador - Polls opened Sunday in El Salvador's presidential elections amid heavy security as voters look for change in a country beset by gang violence and widespread poverty.

Sansalvador - The small Central American country of El Salvador, which holds presidential elections on February 3, suffered a brutal civil war and remains burdened by gang violence and poverty.Here is some background.

Sansalvador - Nayib Bukele is favored to win El Salvador's presidency when voters head to the polls on Sunday, as the country grapples with violence, corruption, poverty and an exodus of migrants seeking to reach the United States.

Sansalvador - El Salvador's murder rate, still one of the highest in the world, dropped for the third year in a row, authorities said on Wednesday.

Sansalvador - El Salvador insisted Saturday that it is taking steps to curb illegal migration to the United States, fending off criticism from President Donald Trump.

Usulut - A judge in El Salvador on Monday acquitted a 20-year-old rape victim originally charged with murder after giving birth prematurely in a toilet.

Caserio Montepeque - Mauricio Vilanova is no typical small-town mayor. The 60-year-old patrols the streets of El Salvador's San Jose Guayabal in a 4x4 vehicle wearing a bulletproof vest and carrying an automatic rifle.

Soyapango - Facing the majestic Chinchontepec volcano a seemingly bucolic path runs past a suburb of El Salvador's capital -- but this "devil's alley" is nothing but a strip of homes emptied by gang violence and swallowed by tropical vegetation.

Sansalvador - As a group of migrants prepare to form a new caravan to set out from El Salvador for the promised land of the United States, eager participants exchange messages over social media.How will they cross the border? What should they bring?

Sansalvador - Human remains have been discovered for the first time in El Salvador's Joya de Ceren, a city buried by a volcanic eruption more than 1,400 years ago and sometimes dubbed the "Mayan Pompeii," the ministry of culture said Thursday.

Sansalvador - Defying US pledges to turn back those seeking asylum at the border, a caravan of about 200 migrants set out Sunday from El Salvador seeking their American dream.

Sansalvador - El Salvador's president said Thursday his government can do nothing to stop migrants fleeing criminal violence in the Central American country and heading to the United States.

Sansalvador - A group of around 300 migrants left the El Salvador capital on foot on Sunday heading for the border with Guatemala in the hope of eventually realizing the "American dream" and reaching the United States.