While covering gang violence in El Salvador, an NPR reporting team faced tough questions about how to report their stories while also protecting sources from harm that could befall them from talking.
Gang violence wasn't always rampant in El Salvador. The Rev. Gerardo Mendez, who works with youth in gang-controlled areas, sat down to talk about how gangs became so powerful in this small country.
Last month was the deadliest on record in the Central America country since the end of the civil war in 1992. There are more than 30 murders a day, due to gang violence.
Unaccompanied minors surged across the U.S. southern border last year, fleeing violence in Central America. This year the Obama administration hopes to forestall a new wave with a quiet new program.
The ceremony for Oscar Romero — who was gunned down during Mass in the capital, San Salvador, in 1980 — is the last step before being declared a saint by the Vatican.
Saturday's ceremony ends a long fight for recognition of the staunch defender of the poor, who was assassinated in 1980. But some say the violence-wracked country is no better now than it was then.