El Salvador is the bloodiest nation in the Western Hemisphere
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El Salvador ended the year with at least 6,640 murders, reported La Prensa Gráfica.
The grisly statistic represents close to a 70 percent increase over 2014 homicides and gives the country a homicide rate of 104.2 per 100,000 inhabitants, the report said.
El Salvador makes up 13.6 percent of Central America's population, yet represents 35.3 percent of Central America's homicides, the report added.
Speaking with Reuters, El Salvador's Forensic Medicine Director Miguel Fortín Magaña described national homicide figures as "truly pandemic."
Jose Cabezas/REUTERS
To begin with, the gang violence is multi-layered, and in some ways the recent spike is related to a failed gang truce, initiated in 2012, between the MS13 and the two factions of the Barrio 18 -- the Revolucionarios and the Sureños. Initally, the truce led to falling murder rates. However, as is evident now, that may have been more about coercion than acceptance amongst the gangs' rank and file.
REUTERS/Jose Cabezas
Following this shift, gangs appear to be fracturing into smaller, competing units and internal purges within the ranks have become a regular occurrence.
Gang cells, or cliques as they are known, are also making their own their decisions with regards to killings rivals and coordinating attacks against security forces, rather than waiting for the proverbial "green light" from the leadership in jail.
Security forces have responded to the violence with heavy-handed tactics. The more extreme incidents have included reports of summary executions of suspected gang members, as well as allegations of security forces' participation in death squads.
Reuters
Unfortunately the situation will likely continue for the foreseeable future. Citing police statistics, La Prensa Gráfica reported 72 murders within the first three days of 2016, including separate multiple homicides, and attacks on security forces and their families.
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