Ecuador declared a state of emergency after prison riots

President of Ecuador, Daniel Noboahe declared a state of emergency this Monday, the first since he began his term last time November 23after a series of riots in at least six prisons in the countrywhich included detaining prison guards and burning mattresses.

The state of emergency will enable actions Armed forceswith the support of the Police, they control the prison centers, as they have done until now.

“I have just signed a decree on the state of emergency so that the Armed Forces have all the political and legal support for their actions,” Noboa said in a message on Instagram.

He also said that he had given precise instructions to the military and police commanders to intervene in the control of the prison system, which today faced a series of riots.

“What we experienced (this Monday in prisons) is an example that things must change in the country and that the laws we have are not enough to live in peace,” said Noboa, who suggested going to a public consultation on issues related to safety and the return of games of chance.

The president blamed drug-trafficking gangs, assassins (hired killers) and organized crime for the prison crisis that has been going on in the country for several years.

And although he did not name any specific ones, he said that some previous governments received dictation from these gangs on what to do, so the riot situation registered this Monday was the result of his government’s decisive action to regain control over the prisons. .

“We will not negotiate with terrorists” and the government will work to restore “peace to all Ecuadorians”, the head of state stressed.

For his part, the police commander in the capitalWilson Pavónhe assured reporters that peace had been restored at the deprivation center in Quito, known as El Inca prisonwhere a group of inmates set fire to mattresses.

Pavón explained that in the first moment “peace and order” was established in that center, and that the second phase involved searching the cells, to continue the third phase of counting the prisoners to confirm that no one had escaped.

The director of the police said that the police caught a prisoner who was trying to escape in the morning, after a disturbance report was issued, and emphasized that no conflicts were recorded in the police operation.

He National Service for Comprehensive Care for Adults Deprived of Liberty (SNAI)state prison unit, reported that at five other prisons, inmates held prison guards, although it did not report the number of officers the inmates took.

These acts of force were recorded in prisons in the provinces El Oro, Loja, Chimborazo, Cotopaxi and Azuay.

Ecuador’s armed forces, in a message on social media, reported that they had deployed “personnel, equipment and logistical means to carry out military security operations in different detention centers in the country” across the country.

The prison incidents this Monday coincided with the actions of the search for José Adolfo Macías Salazar, alias “Fito”the leader of a gang known as “Los Choneros”, considered one of the most dangerous in the country, with alleged ties to Mexican cartels and who reportedly escaped from prison in the province of Guayas.

General Secretary for Communications of the Presidency, Roberto Izurietahe asserted that, with some of the 3000 policemen and army This Monday, they continued the search operation inside the prison where “Fito” was held, whom they described as “a criminal with extremely dangerous characteristics, with activities that have the characteristics of terrorism”.

Asked on a news show about the day of “Fit’s” escape, Izurieta commented that “most likely” information had been leaked and that it was “a matter of hours” before an operation was launched at Guayas prison on Sunday, when they discovered the prisoner was not in his cell.