Kuala Lampur, April 7 -- Wearing white uniforms, their heads shaved, rows of bewildered-looking men are beamed by video link from prisons across El Salvador into a courtroom conducting a mass trial of alleged gang members.

Four years after President Nayib Bukele declared war against gangs in the Central American nation, the fates of thousands of prisoners are being decided en masse with the single swing of a judge's gavel.

Williams Diaz, a 35-year-old air conditioning technician, is one of more than 91,000 people rounded up under a state of emergency-in place since 2022 -- who will be judged with scores of others in a faceless court by an anonymous judge.

He was arrested by soldiers over three years ago while on his way to work and tak...