Vice President Attends Peace Corps Volunteers Swearing In

Charge d'Affaires Robert Blau hand over the diploma to one of the new Peace Corps volunteers. Acting Peace Corps Director Gregory Branch, Salvadoran Vice President Salvador Sanchez Ceren, and FISDL President Hector Silva look on.

On September 4, Salvadoran Vice President Salvador Sánchez Cerén attended the swearing in ceremony of 33 new Peace Corps volunteers who will work in El Salvador.

Among this new group of volunteers, 17 will dedicate their work to environmental education and sustainable agriculture projects, and 16 volunteers will be in charge of youth development projects.  The number of Peace Corps volunteers in El Salvador now reaches 148.

Volunteers were sworn in by Charge d’Affaires Robert Blau after receiving a three-month training course in which they learned Spanish, Salvadoran culture and technical aspects related to municipal development.  Each volunteer will serve in El Salvador for two years.

The Peace Corps’s main goal is to promote friendship around the world, making technical assistance available in countries who want it, allowing volunteers to contribute in satisfying the most pressing needs in the poorest areas of the countries in which they work.

The Peace Corps has a long history of friendship and cooperation with Salvadorans.  The first 20 volunteers arrived in El Salvador in 1962, only one year after the Peace Corps’s creation; however, because of the civil war in El Salvador, the Peace Corps reassigned volunteers to other countries in early 1980.  In 1993, after the signing of the Peace Accords, the Peace Corps returned to El Salvador to resume its service to needy communities.