US authorities earlier this week arrested a retired El Salvadorian military officer accused of participating in a brutal massacre of civilians during the Central American state’s merciless civil war in the 1980s, US immigration officials said.

Agents of the immigration service (Immigration and Customs Enforcement, ICE) arrested Roberto Harai in the state of New Jersey, states a press release published.

Mr. Harai was from 1981 to 1985 an officer in a special forces unit trained in counterinsurgency, the notorious Batallón Atlacalt.

The general e.a. Juan Rafael Bustillo admitted in 2020 that Atlacalt did indeed commit the massacre in El Mosote in 1981, when over a thousand villagers, mostly women and children, were massacred.

The squad carried out extrajudicial killings in El Mosote and at least three other massacres that killed “hundreds of civilians,” the ICE press release explained.

Mr Harai “deliberately” concealed his involvement in the massacre when he applied to immigrate to the US, the statement added.

The retired officer’s defense attorney was not available for comment.

El Salvador’s civil war (1980-1992), which pitted the Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front (FMLN) against the army of the US-backed right-wing government, resulted in the deaths of at least 75,000 people, while another 8,000 ” disappeared” and their fate remains unknown to this day.

The US law enforcement agency added that it aims to hold people accused of war crimes accountable, promising that Mr Harai will be investigated, prosecuted and deported.

Those who have committed atrocities abroad “will not find safe haven in the United States,” Undersecretary of Homeland Security John K. Tien assured, according to the press release.