Abstract

MONTERROSA CUBIAS, Luis Gerardo. The Complex Task of Granting Political Asylum in Central America Mexican Diplomats and the 1939 Presidential re-Election in El Salvador. Estud. hist. mod. contemp. Mex [online]. 2026, n.71, pp.87-115.  Epub Apr 13, 2026. ISSN 0185-2620.  https://doi.org/10.22201/iih.24485004e.2026.71.78046.

The granting of political asylum in Central America was a sensitive issue for the Mexican government during the 1930s, particularly in the case of El Salvador. This article analyses an episode that illustrates this tension: the presidential re-election of General Maximiliano Hernández Martínez in 1939. Drawing on archival sources held in Mexico, Guatemala, and El Salvador, I argue that the Salvadoran government´s intolerance toward political asylum -which it considered as a violation of the principle of non-intervention- combined with El Salvador´s role as Mexico’s regional ally in Central America, complicated the work of Mexican diplomats accredited in that country. These diplomats found themselves caught between Mexico´s prestige as a land of asylum and the scrutiny of a government that perceived its granting of asylum as an affront. The article shows that while the Mexican government exercised its right to grant asylum during this period, the rapprochement between the Guatemalan President Jorge Ubico and his Salvadoran counterpart led it to proceed more with greater caution in this matter.

Keywords : political asylum; Mexican foreign policy; Maximiliano Hernández Martínez; authoritarianism; El Salvador.

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