A confrontation between inmates left at least 20 dead this Sunday, five of them mutilated, in a prison in Ecuador, where authorities regained control of the center, the government reported.
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“20 deceased are reported and have been transferred to the Forensic Center in Cuenca”, pointed out the General Secretariat of Communication of the Presidency in the most recent balance. The Minister of the Interior, Patricio Carrillo, had detailed shortly before that “five mutilated bodies that have been transferred to the forensic center and eight complete lifeless bodies” were found.
The minister specified that there are five seriously injured. According to Carrillo, the penitentiary center was “controlled” after the intervention of 800 policemen and 200 soldiers. “The skirmishes have ceased to exist, but inside there are PPL (the prisoners) with weapons,” said the minister, adding that they are evacuating the blocks one by one in order to confiscate weapons and “clean” the prison.
During the incident, some inmates waved a white flag and others a cloth with red letters saying “take out the maximum”, the pavilion where the prisoners considered the most dangerous are and where the fight originated.
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A “blood” Ehe confrontation, which began around 01:30 local time (06:30 GMT) on Sunday, was due to the fact that “there is an organization that wants to have the power inside the center,” but “there are some cells that have rebelled,” Carrillo explained earlier.
The minister ruled out that the altercation occurred due to overcrowding. In the prison, with a capacity of 2,500 prisoners, there were 1,600 inmates. The official indicated that the massacre took place inside the cells. “The bleeding is inside, but the bodies are outside,” he said, adding that they have found “material of war” such as rifles inside the prison complex.
Earlier, Carrillo wrote on Twitter about the need for legal reforms to sanction prison riots. “We need strong provisions for those who carry out these violent acts. They are identified and must lose all kinds of prison benefits.”
Outside the prison, relatives of the inmates gathered to find out if their relatives were among the deceased. “They have not been able to control what the situation is inside. It seems to me that they should have acted so that there are no more deaths,” a man who preferred not to identify himself and who was looking for news of his brothers and a nephew detained told AFP. .
“Permanent Threat”
Last year, Ecuadorian prisons were the scene of bloody clashes that left more than 320 dead. In February 2021, 79 prisoners died in several simultaneous riots in four prisons in the country, including El Turi.
One of the worst prison massacres in Latin America occurred in September when 119 inmates died in a riot inside a prison in the province of Guayas (southwest). In that same prison, 62 people died in November in a clash between gangs that used firearms, explosives and machetes to finish off their rivals.
“There is an urgent need for the State to regain full control of prisons”
Nelsa Curbelo, who directs the pacification commission created by the government as a result of last year’s massacres, commented that there is “an urgent need for the state to retake total control of prisons.” There is “need for a public policy on the subject, urgency of the prison census underway, investing in comprehensive rehabilitation and respect for the HR (human rights) of PPL,” she wrote on Twitter.
In Ecuador’s 65 prisons, with a capacity for some 30,000 people, there are about 39,000 prisoners (30% overpopulation), of which 15,000 are without sentence. “Unfortunately, prisons have become a permanent threat for a long time, but the will exists and we are going to take the necessary actions,” said Carrillo.
The authorities consider that the massacres are the product of clashes between criminal gangs that dispute territories for the sale of drugs inside and outside the prisons and that they are related to international drug trafficking. Located between Colombia and Peru, Ecuador seized a record 210 tons of drugs in 2021. In the first quarter of this year the police have seized more than 52.1 tons.
AFP
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