SENSUNTEPEQUE, El Salvador, Oct 19, 2024 (BSS/AFP) - A court in El Salvador on Friday acquitted six former guerrillas, including five anti-mining campaigners, whose trial for a civil war era murder was criticized by fellow environmentalists as politicized.

Prosecutors had sought up to 36 years in prison for the former rebels of the leftist Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front.

But the judges acquitted them "due to the statute of limitations" and ordered their immediate release, defense lawyer Carolina Herrador told AFP after the hearing in the city of Sensuntepeque.

The court upheld arrest warrants for two other fugitive suspects, Herrador said.

Prosecutors accused the eight former guerrillas of killing a woman in 1989 because they suspected she was an army informant.

The five environmentalists campaigned for a ban on metal mining that was introduced in 2017 but which activists fear President Nayib Bukele wants to reverse.

"We never had any doubt about our innocence. Today we have come out with our heads held high. We were not mistaken about our innocence," Pedro Rivas, one of the environmentalists, told AFP.

Supporters outside the court shouted "freedom!" and greeted the activists with hugs.

The United Nations Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights defenders and other experts expressed concern in a letter to Bukele's government after the 2023 arrests that the case was an attempt to intimidate environmentalists.

The activists' supporters argued that the speed of the trial contrasted with the lack of an investigation into massacres the military is accused of carrying out during the 1980-1992 civil war.

The case was motivated by "powerful political and economic interests" targeting opponents of mining, David Morales, of the non-governmental organization Cristosal, told AFP.