There’s no peace for the Cathedral of San Salvador, where the remains of Mgr. Oscar Arnulfo Romero, Archbishop of the capital of El Salvador, are buried.
The archbishop was assassinated on 24 March 1980, as he celebrated mass.
After the controversy surrounding the removal of the mosaic adorning its façade – which was removed without consulting Archbishop José Luis Escobar Alas – for the past few days, the cathedral has been occupied by a group of ex-servicemen who fought in El Salvador’s civil war, making even the celebration of mass last Sunday impossible.
The archbishop was not even able to hold his usual press conference marking the anniversary of the signing of the Peace Agreements which put an end to the conflict that was going on in the Central American Country.
The ex-servicemen who occupied the cathedral last week, are asking for an end to “political repression” by the State against former guerrillas and the reinstatement of police forces.
They have also announced that they will not be leaving until the government opens negotiations to discuss their demands.
Today, the Catholic Church sees the results of the “Peace Agreements” – signed on 16 January 1992 in Chapultepec, in Mexico City – as positive, although the Country needs “further steps to be taken.”
In a note, Mgr. Escobar Alas stated that the Church has “always appreciated the Peace Agreements. These have, for the most part, been implemented and the results observed are, on the whole, positive. The fact that we have not returned to war is crucial and the country deserves international recognition of this, even though the country is currently going through another phase of violence.”
However, the archbishop is “bitterly aware of the violence and the poverty in which we are living. We must not forget the many victims of today’s violence. It is a problem that needs to be solved.”