The Fifth Investigative Court in San Salvador asked Interpol in El Salvador to issue a red broadcast to arrest the former President of the Legislative Assembly, Norman Quijano, accused of electoral fraud and illegal groups.

Quijano has an arrest warrant in El Salvador after the prosecutor’s office accused him of negotiating with gangs for electoral purposes while he was a presidential candidate in 2014. The court ordered that his case be transferred to an official investigation but with preventive detention.

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According to a report by the Isidro Mendes Judicial Center, the judge argues in her decision that Coygano “affected the pervasive legal principles of society and that the events occurred in the context of democratic presidential elections.”

According to the judicial petition, there are indications that the accused is outside the country and that he is awaiting the immigration report that he requested from the immigration authorities.

When he was charged in court on April 29, Quijano said he was in Honduras attending some personal proceedings, then confirmed that he was in that country to receive the covid-19 vaccine. At the same time, however, he said that he would soon return to El Salvador to meet this demand.

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The attorney general’s office sued Quijano in court, accusing him of meeting with gang members in the middle of the 2014 presidential campaign in order to get votes in favor of his project. This meeting was supposed to take place during a meeting of the National Shepherds Network in a San Salvador neighborhood.

According to witnesses, Chijano had promised them benefits if he won the presidency.

Coygano denied that he had met gang members, and said it was a meeting with local communities and that he had not made offers of money in exchange for electoral support.