{"id":15564,"date":"2024-01-10T00:37:48","date_gmt":"2024-01-10T05:37:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/newssprinters.com\/index.php\/world\/ecuador-plunges-into-crisis-amid-prison-riots-kidnappings\/10\/01\/2024\/"},"modified":"2024-01-10T00:37:48","modified_gmt":"2024-01-10T05:37:48","slug":"ecuador-plunges-into-crisis-amid-prison-riots-kidnappings","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/newssprinters.com\/index.php\/world\/ecuador-plunges-into-crisis-amid-prison-riots-kidnappings\/10\/01\/2024\/","title":{"rendered":"Ecuador Plunges Into Crisis Amid Prison Riots, Kidnappings"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\n<\/p>\n<div>\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Gunmen wearing masks stormed a television station in Ecuador\u2019s largest city on Tuesday, taking anchors and staff hostage and exchanging gunfire with the police as cameras rolled before the intruders were subdued and arrested.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">The televised violence, captured live, erupted in the city of Guayaquil as the South American country has descended into chaos this week, with a powerful gang leader disappearing from prison, uprisings breaking out in several prisons and inmates kidnapping and threatening guards.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div>\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">One of the attackers who stormed the TV station could be heard on the air asking to be wired up with a microphone, saying he intended to send a message about the consequences of \u201cmessing with the mafias.\u201d Before he could, the police intervened. The armed men also forced the anchors and other staff being held hostage to appear in a video asking the president not to interfere.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div>\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">The police said on social media that they had arrested 13 people after the episode, recovering \u201cweapons, explosives and other evidence.\u201d The hostages were taken to safety, <a class=\"css-yywogo\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/CmdtPoliciaEc\/status\/1744853625841602707\" title=\"\" rel=\"noopener\" target=\"_blank\">the post said.<\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">By Tuesday afternoon, at least eight people had died and two others had been injured in violent episodes in Guayaquil, according to the city\u2019s mayor, Aquiles \u00c1lvarez, who held <a class=\"css-yywogo\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/RadioHuancavilk\/status\/1744877085561172364\" title=\"\" rel=\"noopener\" target=\"_blank\">a news conference<\/a> alongside the chief of police. The authorities also said five hospitals had been overtaken.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Explosions, burning vehicles, looting and gunfire were also reported across the country, and the authorities announced that a second major gang leader and other inmates had escaped from another prison.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Ecuador\u2019s president, Daniel Noboa, declared an internal armed conflict on Tuesday and ordered the armed forces to \u201cneutralize\u201d two dozen gangs, which he described as \u201cterrorist organizations,\u201d according to a post on X, formerly known as Twitter.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Shops, schools, government offices and buildings were shut down. Workers were sent home, and streets in Quito and Guayaquil were jammed with traffic.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div>\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">\u201cIt was chaotic, as you can imagine,\u201d said Carolina Valencia, who was visiting family in Guayaquil from New York. \u201cThere was traffic everywhere because people just wanted to get home. The buses weren\u2019t fully operating, so people were jumping on the pickup trucks that are open in the back.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">\u201cThere was a lot of desperation,\u201d she added. \u201cSince this gangster disappeared, everyone has been in constant fear.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Mr. Noboa, who has prioritized restoring security to a country awash in gang violence fueled by a flourishing drug trade, had earlier declared a state of emergency and deployed more than 3,000 police and military officers to search for the escaped gang leader, Adolfo Mac\u00edas.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">The 60-day declaration imposes a nationwide overnight curfew and allows the military to patrol the streets and take control of the prisons.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">\u201cThe time is over when drug-trafficking convicts, hit men and organized crime dictate to the government what to do,\u201d Mr. Noboa said in a video announcing the state of emergency on Monday, adding that it was necessary for security forces to take control of Ecuador\u2019s prison system.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div>\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Mr. Mac\u00edas, who is the head of Los Choneros gang and is better known as \u201cFito,\u201d disappeared on Sunday from an overcrowded prison in the coastal city of Guayaquil, from which he has long overseen his group\u2019s operations.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">The government had ordered the transfer of high-profile convicts, including Mr. Mac\u00edas, from the cells where they have been running their criminal rings to a maximum-security facility. That decision, prison experts said, may have led to the escape of Mr. Mac\u00edas and the prison uprisings.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div>\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Some security experts believe that as many as one-fourth of the country\u2019s 36 prisons are controlled by gangs. Mr. Noboa has vowed to retake control of the prisons, which have become both gang headquarters and recruiting centers.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Last week, he announced that he was seeking to hold a referendum on security measures, including harsher sentences for crimes like murder and arms trafficking, and expanding the role of the military.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div>\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Mr. Noboa, the center-right scion of a banana dynasty, took office in November after an election dominated by worries about safety and the economy. Violence has spiraled in recent years as gangs have battled for control of lucrative drug-trafficking routes that transport narcotics to the United States and Europe.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Those fears were amplified by the assassination on the campaign trail of another presidential candidate, Fernando Villavicencio, who had said not long before his killing that he had been under threat from Los Choneros.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Mr. Mac\u00edas is perhaps the most well known of the gang leaders running drug operations from behind bars, and his group is believed to have been one of the first in Ecuador to forge ties with powerful Mexican cartels.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Mr. Mac\u00edas, who is serving a 34-year sentence for crimes that include drug trafficking, escaped from prison once before, in 2013. He became the leader of Los Choneros around 2020 and presided over the gang\u2019s activities from his cell in the Guayaquil prison, part of a compound that holds around 12,000 inmates.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div>\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">After Mr. Villavicencio was assassinated last summer, Mr. Mac\u00edas was briefly moved to a maximum-security wing in the same compound. But his lawyer appealed, and a judge ordered Mr. Mac\u00edas to be transferred back to his preferred spot in the prison in Guayaquil, which serves as the Choneros\u2019s base.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div>\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">He celebrated by releasing a music video in the style of a \u201cnarcocorrido,\u201d a genre originating in Mexico that glorifies the violent feats of drug traffickers.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Last month, Mr. Noboa, promoting his plans to tackle the country\u2019s prisons, said he would start with measures such as cutting off Mr. Mac\u00edas\u2019 access to power outlets and routers. \u201cYou can see on YouTube that Fito\u2019s cell has four outlets, more outlets than in a hotel room.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Mr. Mac\u00edas was found missing from his cell during a sweep for contraband. His disappearance came as he and other high-profile criminals were scheduled to be sent to the maximum-security prison, according to officials.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">A top government official suggested this week that Mr. Mac\u00edas may have learned of his imminent transfer through a government leak. \u201cThat would be very serious,\u201d said the official, Esteban Torres, because \u201cit would mean that there is rot at the highest levels of government.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div>\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Securing Ecuador\u2019s prisons is vital to making sure efforts to root out corruption are effective, said Will Freeman, a fellow for Latin America studies at the Council on Foreign Relations.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">\u201cYou need to make sure that when you actually send people to prison for money laundering or working in complicity with organized crime as public officials, that the punishment is meaningful and that they\u2019re not just continuing to operate criminal rings from jails,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">He said a state of emergency could help stabilize the prisons, since the entity tasked with running the prison system had failed to control gangs, but that it was not a long-term solution. He noted that Mr. Noboa\u2019s predecessor had repeatedly imposed similar measures.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">\u201cObviously they didn\u2019t really durably improve the situation,<em class=\"css-2fg4z9 e1gzwzxm0\">\u201d <\/em>he said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Jorge N\u00fa\u00f1ez, an anthropologist who has studied the Ecuadorean prison system for years, said Mr. Noboa was not doing anything dramatically different when it came to the penitentiary system.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div>\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">\u201cIt\u2019s a mix of improvisation, and basically doing the same thing,\u201d said Mr. N\u00fa\u00f1ez, who said the previous government had turned the prisons over to the police, who had<strong class=\"css-8qgvsz ebyp5n10\"> <\/strong>overlooked \u201cthe growth and excessive empowerment<em class=\"css-2fg4z9 e1gzwzxm0\"> <\/em>of prison gangs.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">The privileges extended to cartel leaders increased over time, he added.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Sweeps of prisons have revealed not only extensive caches of weapons and electronics, but also pigs, roosters and a cockfighting ring.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">On Monday night, as the first curfew approached, the streets of Quito, the capital, were quickly deserted. Only police cars and ambulances could be seen in a quiet reminiscent of the Covid-19 pandemic lockdown.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">\u201cThe curfew affects us directly,\u201d said Junior C\u00f3rdova, a restaurant owner in Quito. \u201cWe had a great beginning to the year, but that\u2019s not looking so good now, because people are starting to feel scared.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-798hid etfikam0\">Annie Correal<!-- --> and <!-- -->Genevieve Glatsky<!-- --> reported from Bogot\u00e1, Colombia, and <!-- -->Jos\u00e9 Mar\u00eda Le\u00f3n Cabrera<!-- --> from Quito, Ecuador.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<p><script async src=\"\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2024\/01\/09\/world\/americas\/ecuador-gang-prison-emergency.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Gunmen wearing masks stormed a television station in Ecuador&rsquo;s largest city on Tuesday, taking anchors and staff hostage and exchanging gunfire with<br \/><button class=\"read-more\"><a href=\"https:\/\/newssprinters.com\/index.php\/world\/ecuador-plunges-into-crisis-amid-prison-riots-kidnappings\/10\/01\/2024\/\">Read More &rsaquo;<\/a><\/button><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":15566,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/newssprinters.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15564"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/newssprinters.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/newssprinters.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newssprinters.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newssprinters.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15564"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/newssprinters.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15564\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newssprinters.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15566"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/newssprinters.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15564"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newssprinters.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15564"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newssprinters.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15564"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}