Victoria Marina Velásquez de Avilés

Victoria Marina Velásquez de Avilés (born 5 July 1943) is a Salvadoran jurist.

Biography Victoria Marina Velásquez was born in Usulután in 1943. In 1974, she graduated from the University of El Salvador as a doctor of jurisprudence and social sciences.

In 1979, she was appointed undersecretary of the by the first Revolutionary Government Junta, but in January 1980, she resigned from this position along with several other officials, citing the Junta's inability to control human rights violations and its failure to implement agrarian and social reforms. In the 1980s she worked as a lawyer in free practice, advising social organizations on human rights and labor relations, as well as acting as a notary.

After the signing of the Chapultepec Peace Accords in 1992, she was named Deputy Prosecutor of the Rights of the Child, and in 1995 she was elected as head of the Office of the . Serving until 1998, she received international recognition for her commitment to consolidate the institution established in the Peace Accords in the sense of genuine surveillance of abuses of power and human rights violations committed by agents of the state. However, the right-wing parties represented in the Legislative Assembly rejected her reelection and chose Eduardo Peñate Polanco as her successor, despite his lack of background in human rights work.

In 1998 she was proposed as a presidential candidate by the National Convention of the Farabundo Martí National Liberation Front, along with the mayor of San Salvador, Héctor Silva. After a prolonged debate, the convention decided not to choose either of them, and opted for a consensus candidate, Facundo Guardado.

In 2000, Velásquez was elected as a magistrate of the Supreme Court for a term of nine years, exercising her duties in the Civil Chamber from 2000 to 2003 and the Constitutional Chamber from 2003 to 2009.