THOUSANDS more skinhead inmates have been crammed inside the world's biggest mega-prison as the world got a glimpse of their living conditions.
Another 2,000 suspected gang members were shipped into the "inescapable" Izalco jail in El Salvador, where they only have a metal sheet to rest their heads.
The high-tech facility in one of the world's most dangerous countries can house up to 40,000 gangsters and is guarded around the clock.
The so-called Terrorism Containment Center in the murder capital is constantly patrolled by 250 police officers and 600 soldiers.
President Nayib Bukele announced a fresh batch of inmates had been sent to the high-security hell hole on Wednesday.
He shared chilling footage of topless and barefoot cons – wearing only white shorts with their heads shaved – being hurried inside.
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The men bowed their heads as they entered their terrifying new home after being ushered onto packed buses with their hands and feet shackled just before sunrise.
They were transported to Izalco accompanied by a huge police escort and met by rows of fearsome guards armed to the teeth.
Defense Minister Rene Francis Marino said 1,200 soldiers and three Air Force helicopters took part in the security operation that began at dawn.
Heavily tattooed detainees were rushed inside, where they were made to sit in rows with their hands behind their heads.
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The holding area was so overcrowded that the men were forced to sit with their legs on either side of the person in front of them.
They daren't glance at the armed guards donning balaclavas as they sat in silence, preparing to face their new grim reality.
The latest look inside the facility revealed more than President Bukele's hardline approach to gang violence plaguing the nation.
His crackdown on organised crime is reflected inside the prison's walls – with only bleak concrete and harsh metal to stare at.
Emotionless inmates were corralled in large groups to sit beside their new beds – bare four-storey sheet metal bunks without mattresses.
Each cell only has two sinks and two toilets – while only 80 metal bunks are meant to serve every 100 prisoners.
A mask-wearing prison warden previously told journalists when the notorious jail was unveiled: "There will be no mattresses in the cells."
Reports claim prisoners will only leave their cells to attend legal hearings or be punished in a windowless isolation cell.
'DEPTHS OF DEHUMANISATION'
They were forced to walk and kneel with their foreheads pressing into the back of the man in front at the strict Izalco facility.
The presenter of Netflix's World's Toughest Prisons, Raphael Rowe, said the images of conditions in the jail were deeply concerning.
The former British prisoner said: "The intensity of what these new pictures show, and the sheer depth of dehumanisation, is exceptional even to me.
"This is a deliberate policy to control the inmates and manage them.
"I fear it will backfire badly — and result in violence even worse than the gang-driven chaos the government is desperately trying to stamp out."
Although there are dining halls, exercise rooms and table tennis tables – they are exclusively for guards' use.
Prison officials with assault rifles patrol the facility 24/7, making it "impossible to escape".
The first batch of inked-up inmates arrived at the terrifying mega-prison in February, with President Bukele celebrating the fact they will "live there for decades, mixed up, unable to do any more harm to the population."
STRIPPED OF EVERYTHING
Built in a remote area near Tecoluca, it covers 166 hectares and could be the largest prison in the world.
Buckele said in the new gigantic prison inmates will no longer have access to "prostitutes, PlayStations, screens, mobile phones and computers."
Electronic equipment will block cell phone signals to prevent any communication from the prison.
The country's Deputy Justice Minister Osiris Luna said the inmates would be made to work to "compensate for some of the damage they did to society."
He said: "All the terrorists who (caused) grief and pain to the Salvadoran people will serve their sentences… under the most severe regime."
Bukele asked his allies in El Salvador's Congress to pass a state of exception last year, which has since been extended several times.
It suspends some constitutional rights after a dramatic spike in murders attributed to violent gangs.
The latest transfer operation took place on the same day that Justice and Security Minister Gustavo Villatoro asked parliament to extend the state of emergency for another month.
The prison has come under fire from human rights groups, who condemned the "severe overcrowding" following mass arrests.
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El Salvador's largest prison, La Esperanza, currently holds 33,000 people despite having a capacity of 10,000.
With nearly two percent of its adult population behind bars, El Salvador has the highest incarceration rate in the world.
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