El Salvador sends 10,000 police, army to seal off town

The government of El Salvador sent 10,000 soldiers and police to seal off a town on the outskirts of the nation's capital Saturday to search for gang members.

The operation was one of the largest mobilizations in President NayibBukele's nine-month-old crackdown on street gangs that long extorted money from businesses and ruled many neighbourhoods of the capital, San Salvador.

The troops blocked roads going in and out of the township of Soyapango, checking people's documents. Special teams went into the town looking for gang suspects.  El Salvador's gangs, which have been estimated to count some 70,000 members in their ranks, have long controlled swaths of territory and extorted and killed with impunity.