Men with rifles and grenades burst on live this Tuesday on a television channel in Ecuadorin a day of terror in which the president Daniel Noboa declared the country in “internal armed conflict” and ordered the military to “neutralize” the narcocriminal gangs that intensified their attacks.
(See also: At least eight dead and two injured left violent attacks)
“I have signed the executive decree declaring an Internal Armed Conflict,” said the president through the social network while a state of emergency is in force for 60 days due to the kidnappings of police officers, attacks on the press and prison riots.
The 36-year-old president also ordered the Armed forces “execute military operations (…) to neutralize” about twenty organized crime groups which he identified as “terrorist organizations and belligerent non-state actors.”
Among them, he listed the “Águilas, Águilas Killer, Ak47, Caballeros Oscuros, Chone Killers, Choneros, Covicheros, Cuartel de las Feas, Cubanos, Fatales, Gánster, Kater Piler, Lagartos, Latin Kings, Lobos, los p.27, the Sharks, Mafia 18, Mafia Trébol, Patrones, R7, Tiguerones.”
The decree was announced after hooded armed men entered the TC channel Television in Guayaquil when journalists were broadcasting a news program live, which caused a dramatic situation that lasted for at least 30 minutes until the police intervened.
“Don't shoot, please, don't shoot,” shouted a woman in the midst of explosions on the television set. Before the lights went out on the set, the hooded men were observed holding a grenade, pointing weapons at workers and placing what looked like a stick of dynamite in a person's jacket.
This is a plan well worked out by the criminal structures that studied and prepared it for at least two or three months.
The police stated hours later that they had put an end to the takeover of the canal and that they had arrested 13 people, without – until press time – giving more details of the case.
And, despite the unprecedented nature of the situation this Tuesday, last March, five envelopes with USB flash drives loaded with explosives were sent to journalists from various media outlets, one of whom suffered minor injuries after the detonation.
In addition to this, the country experienced in other cities the explosion of cars, attacks with explosives, kidnappings of police officers, detention of agents in penitentiary centers, and the invasion of armed men into a television channel and some commercial establishments. In fact, in Guayaquil, according to authorities, eight people died and two were injured as a result of these attacks.
“What we have seen is a set of terrorist acts that try to sow anxiety among the population. The National Assembly has offered to pardon police or military personnel who are involved in violent acts due to a defense situation and, minutes later, the publication of the executive decree through which President Noboa recognizes an internal armed conflict in the country. That, of course, unleashed widespread panic within the population,” Luis Córdova-Alarcón, coordinator of the Research, Order, Conflict and Violence program at the Central University of Ecuador (UCE), explains to this newspaper.
For the academic, it is important to highlight that “this is not an issue that began on Tuesday nor was it planned spontaneously. “This is a plan well worked out by the criminal structures that studied and prepared it for at least two or three months.”
For two days now, Ecuador has been experiencing nights of terror following the escape of Adolfo Macías, alias Fito, head of the main criminal gang, known as Los Choneros, from a prison where he was.
In response, President Noboa declared on Monday a state of emergency that is in effect for 60 days throughout the country, including prisons. The measure includes a six-hour curfew, starting at 11 p.m. local time.
Photograph released by the Ecuadorian Police that shows a group of men reduced to the ground after their arrest by the Public Force today, in Guayaquil (Ecuador).
Added to the escape of 'Fito' on Tuesday was the escape of Fabricio Colón Pico, leader of Los Lobos, arrested on Friday for the crime of kidnapping and his alleged responsibility in a plan to assassinate the attorney general.
In the midst of the outbreak, seven police officers were kidnapped in Machala (southwest), Quito and El Empalme (south). Explosions were also reported against a police station, in front of the home of the president of the National Court of Justice, and vehicles were set on fire.
In prisons in five cities in the country there are 125 prison guards and 14 administrative officials detained, said the body that manages prisons (SNAI).
This is the first crisis that the Noboa government faces after assuming power in November with the promise of attacking drug groups, linked to Colombian and Mexican cartels, with a heavy hand.
“These are extremely difficult days because (…) the important decision is to face these threats with terrorist characteristics head-on,” said the Secretary of Communication of the Government, Roberto Izurieta, in an interview with the digital channel Visionarias.
Ecuadorian police officers deployed in the streets.
'Fito' was serving a 34-year sentence in the Guayaquil Regional Prison for organized crime, drug trafficking and murder.
'Los Choneros' compete with around twenty gangs over drug trafficking routes in a war that is bleeding the country dry.
Under this panorama, the analyst Córdova-Alarcón highlights: “The problem the Government is in is that the Armed Forces and the Police have a huge infiltration of organized crime in their ranks.”
And he adds: “A few weeks ago, the prosecutor made the Metastasis case public, demonstrating how a police general who became anti-narcotics director in Guillermo Lasso's government and directed the entire prison system worked for criminal organizations. Therefore, if things continue like this, going to a direct confrontation will end up leading the country to problems of 'false positives', chain of command problems, etc.”
'Unprecedented' crisis
Noboa, who led a meeting of the Security Council in Quitoattributed the attack on the prisons as retaliation for his actions to “regain official control” of the prisons and warned that he will not negotiate with “terrorists.”
Last week, the president said that he will build two maximum security prisons in the provinces of Pastaza (east) and Santa Elena (southwest), in the style of those established by his Salvadoran counterpart. Nayib Bukelein their war against gangs.
Sectors of indigenous people from the Amazon called for peaceful protests this Tuesday in rejection of this project in Pastaza, their biodiverse and oil territory.
The violent acts also occurred in the coastal Esmeraldas (northwest and near the border with Colombia), one of the Ecuadorian provinces controlled by mafias.
In the capital, the explosion of a car and the explosion of an artifact near a pedestrian bridge were also reported. Its mayor, Pabel Muñoz, asked the Executive to “militarize” strategic facilities in the face of the “unprecedented security crisis.”
Located in the middle of Colombia and Peruthe world's largest cocaine producers, Ecuador went from being an island of peace to a drug war fort.
2023 closed with more than 7,800 homicides and 220 tons of drugs seized, new records in the nation of 17 million inhabitants.
Since 2021, clashes between prisoners have left more than 460 dead. In addition, homicides on the streets between 2018 and 2023 grew by almost 800 percent, going from 6 to 46 per 100,000 inhabitants.
Therefore, for Córdova-Alarcón it is essential to rethink the discussion about institutions and development throughout the region.
“It is no coincidence that Latin America is the most violent region in the world and that criminal violence is epidemic. In the case of Ecuador, recovering the state of minimal peaceful coexistence depends on three elements: what the Government does, the way in which the president manages to build collective leadership with other political actors and what the actors linked to the government do. organized crime. The interaction of these three elements in the next 72 hours will be fundamental for what happens in the country going forward.” Córdova-Alarcón pointed out.
STEPHANY ECHAVARRÍA
INTERNATIONAL EDITOR
TIME
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