QUITO.- The president of Ecuador Daniel Noboa reported that he expects weapons, technology and training from the United States to confront the criminal organizations that have unleashed an uncontrollable spiral of violence in recent weeks.
The highest Ecuadorian authorities plan to receive in the next few hours a US delegation chaired by the Special Presidential Advisor for the Americas, Christopher Dodd; Army General Laura Richardson and Deputy Assistant Secretary of the Office of Counternarcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs Christopher Landberg.
“The United States and the world have seen what is happening in Ecuador and know how important it is to have Ecuador protected,” Noboa said in an interview with the Teleamazonas television network in which he asserted that the country “has become a piece key within the structure and routes of these narcoterrorist groups.”
Regarding US support, Noboa pointed out that in parallel Ecuador also needs “something essential: refinancing of external debt… so that while we fight this war we are not financially hanged.”
Since the beginning of 2021, organized crime gangs linked to drug trafficking have unleashed a wave of insecurity with violent deaths, extortions, kidnappings and repeated riots in prisons that seemed to reach another level last week when a group of hooded men took over a television channel with weapons and explosives, which was broadcast live.
A few days before, Adolfo Macías, alias Fito, the dangerous leader of the largest criminal organization in the country, Los Choneros, disappeared from a Guayaquil prison, and then another regional leader of another gang, Fabricio Pico, fled, who has not been able to be located.
After this, Noboa decreed a state of internal war to confront the unbridled criminal violence with the support of combined groups of military and police that maintain a strong presence in the streets.
“We are at war and we managed to stop what was an avalanche of violence and destruction,” said the Ecuadorian president, who highlighted that the indicators of violent deaths and crime have dropped dramatically.
The government awaits approval by the Assembly of an asset forfeiture law to use the assets and money of criminal groups in the fight against them. In addition, the Constitutional Court must approve a new agreement with the United States to facilitate the fight against the groups that the government calls narcoterrorists.
Noboa insisted on the proposal to free up space in prisons through the repatriation of some 1,500 prisoners, especially from Colombia and Peru, for which he said he maintains contacts with the governments of those countries. He also confirmed that he maintains the proposal to build two new prisons.
To address the conflict situation, the president said that he is preparing to make cuts of 1 billion dollars in the state structure, especially in administrative and personnel expenses, “because the State has to tighten its belt and make an essential sacrifice.” .
ecuador-militarized
AFP
Source: AP
