"7/2/2005 --San Salvador, El Salvador --  This is the first two minutes that Maria Cebollero (right) and Imelda Auron were reunited with their three surviving siblings and dozens of nieces, nephews, aunts and uncles. (They are hugging Salvador, the eldest brother. The man to the left in the picture is psychologist Marco Perez, who guided the sisters through the reunification.) The girls' parents, who preached Liberation Theology, and two of their older sisters were murdered by the Salvadoran Death Squads on July 31, 1980, which effectively tore the family apart. The sisters' two older brothers joined the Salvadoran Army, and one of them joined the battalion that was notorious in El Salvador for committing the worst atrocities of the civil war (Batallón Atlacatl -- accent over the ""o""). This is tragic and ironic because their murdered parents were on exactly the other side of the conflict than the army and death squads. After their parents' deaths, Maria and Imelda were bounced around among family members for three years before being offered for adoption to the United States by their aunt. They were raised separately and have led very different lives. Imelda is a Montessori school teacher in Boston and Maria is an exotic dancer in Rhode Island. The agency that united them with their family is called Pro-Busqueda, and is headquartered in San Salvador.  Story by Yvonne Abraham; Photo by Dina Rudick, Boston Globe Staff"
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