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AURORA | The vice president of El Salvador touted his beleaguered country’s progress while visiting Aurora.
Vice President Félix Ulloa and city officials held a networking event Wednesday where he spoke at length about how his country has improved and pitched investment opportunities to community members. Ulloa will also attend a reception Wednesday evening, which is hosted by Mayor Mike Coffman.
In 2021, an estimated 2.5 million Hispanics with Salvadoran origin – including people who immigrated from El Salvador and people who can trace their family ancestry to the county – live in the United States according to a report from the Pew Research Center. Most of the Salvadoran immigrant population is concentrated in California, Texas, Maryland, New York and Virginia.
During the networking event, Ulloa boasted his country’s low homicide rate. What was once dubbed the “murder capital of the world,” Ulloa claimed that El Salvador has not seen a homicide in approximately 500 days. However, a news report updated on Dec. 10 stated that the national police reported 142 homicides from Jan. 1 to Dec. 9. The homicide data does not include the deaths of alleged gang members who have died during confrontation with law enforcement. U.S. News and World Report set that number at 600 in January.
The nation has for months been under a state of emergency and tens of thousands of people accused of gang affiliation have been incarcerated.
Ulloa did not take questions from the media during or directly after his presentation.
Ulloa also spoke at length about the county’s use of bitcoin.
El Salvador is the first country in the world to recognize bitcoin as legal tender.
Last week, the county repaid one of two outstanding $800 million bonds, the country’s treasury minister announced, pushing back worries the government could default amid its decision to make the volatile cryptocurrency bitcoin legal tender.
Treasury Minister Alejandro Zelaya tweeted on Monday night that the government had completed payment on a bond that was due to mature this week. “El Salvador meets its debt obligations,” he wrote.
The government still owes $367 million plus interest on an $800 million bond maturing in January 2025.
The country’s treasury minister said his office paid back $196 million of the debt last year through the partial buyback of the bond maturing this week. The debt was issued by previous administrations in 1999 and 2004.
Earlier this month, El Salvador reached a deal with the Central American Bank for Economic Integration for a $350 million loan. It wasn’t clear if that loan helped the government pay off the bond.
In a Jan. 5 statement, the bank said it was “to strengthen the administration of government revenues and expenses through measures to reduce the tax gap and increase tax collection, as well as reduce smuggling and tax evasion.”
In January of last year, the International Monetary Fund asked the government to reverse its decision to make bitcoin legal tender. El Salvador President Nayib Bukele refused and the government has invested more than $106 million in the cryptocurrency, whose value plunged last year.
Ulloa’s visits are a part of an effort to “strengthen diplomatic, economic and cultural ties between Aurora and El Salvador,” according to a press statement from the city.
According to a 2018 report from Aurora Sister Cities International, Salvadorans were the third largest foreign-born population in the city. At the time of the report, over 3,000 Salvadorans lived in Aurora.
— The Associated Press contributed to this story.
“Ulloa did not take questions from the media during or directly after his presentation.”
His county was the first to take on the crypto experiment as legal tender. So_ big deal… His country is broke– his trip here as an ambassador is offering the gimmick of economic regeneration coupled to the bitcoin theory.
A room full of city poseurs oohing and awing this Veep’s notion of lofty ideals to come soon. Now, how bout a little help with some taxpayer money??
This is what happens when you collaborate rather than investigate. Total lack of objectivity which goes against everything true journalism stands for.