U.S.-El Salvador Sister Cities

The U.S.-El Salvador Sister Cities network was born during the Civil War in El Salvador with the purpose of supporting refugee populations returning to “repopulate” their communities in the face of a continuing armed conflict. With the signing of the 1992 peace accords the war of U.S.-funded bombs and bullets ended, replaced by an economic war that continues to be waged against the rural communities of El Salvador. The mission of Sister Cities today, with its network of 21 communities across the U.S., is to accompany the struggle our sisters and brothers in El Salvador in their communities and national organization, CRIPDES, through moral, economic, and political support, and the strengthening of a social movement in the United States, working towards our mutual goals.

The long range goals of U.S.-El Salvador Sister Cities are, as a grass-roots organization and in coordination with CRIPDES, to strengthen organizing, popular education and mobilization in our communities in the U.S. and our sister communities in El Salvador. Our objective is to have the capacity to make proposals and have effective advocacy to counter the corporate globalization model and its effects on our communities, to create and implement together cultural and economic alternatives, and defend our human rights for the basic necessities of our communities. Sister Cities looks to create a cultural-economic model of relationships between our communities that is based not on supply, demand and profit, but on justice, solidarity, and empowerment.