Ambassador Mattanya Cohen says the distinction will be awarded posthumously to Jose Arturo Castellanos, who gave citizenship certificates to as many as 40,000 Jews during the Holocaust.

The "Righteous Among the Nations" recognizes non-Jews who helped Jews escape death in Nazi-controlled Europe.

Castellanos is the first Salvadoran to be so recognized. He served as El Salvador's consul general in Geneva, Switzerland, in the early 1940s. He died at age 86 in his homeland in 1977.

The announcement was made Thursday.