Tag Archives: Ecuador

Financed by Washington, Panama announces more migrant deportation flights

migrant-repatriation-flight-from-Panama

Important Takeaways:

  • Panama’s government announced on Thursday additional deportation flights for migrants apprehended in the Central American nation to Ecuador, India and China, in a bid to reduce the flow of mostly U.S.-bound migration.
  • Financed by Washington, the deportation flights kicked off earlier this week with a first planeload of Colombian migrants.
  • The flights come less than three months before November’s U.S. presidential election, where unlawful migration has emerged as a major issue.
  • Mulino did not specify the legal status of the migrants who will be flown to Ecuador or the two Asian countries, or if they have criminal records.

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Ecuador in War with Drug Gangs

Gang-War-Ecuador

Important Takeaways:

  • Inmates rioted in jails where gangs wield outsize control, taking prison guards and administrative workers hostage, while on the streets a wave of violence has left 19 people dead.
  • Ecuador’s security forces on Sunday took back control of several prisons that had fallen into the hands of gang members, after securing the release of more than 200 officials held hostage inside the jails.
  • The country’s simmering security crisis erupted last week as the government and powerful narco gangs declared all-out war on each other, after the prison escape of a dangerous drug lord.
  • Unverified images on social media of looting, brutal murders and other attacks have struck terror into the population.
  • Authorities announced the release of 201 prison guards and administrative officials, from prisons across seven provinces.

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Ecuador’s president extends state of emergency for prisons

By Alexandra Valencia

QUITO (Reuters) – President Guillermo Lasso renewed a state of emergency throughout Ecuador’s prison system on Monday, extending it for 30 days as the country grapples to control jail violence which has left scores of inmates dead.

Lasso first imposed a state of emergency in penitentiaries at the end of September due to violence at the Penitenciaria del actions.Litoral prison, where fighting between criminal gangs in the last two months has left more than 180 prisoners dead.

Ecuador’s armed forces will continue to support police in controlling prisons.

Following the most recent incident at the Penitenciaria del Litoral, located in the city of Guayaquil, a combined force of 1,000 police officers and soldiers entered the prison.

The Constitutional Court has questioned the measures rolled out across prisons, saying that the crisis will require more than temporary emergency actions.

The gangs operating inside prisons are linked to drug trafficking, authorities say.

The decree to extends the state of emergency includes a ban on prisoners receiving mail that has not been read by security forces first, among other measures.

Ecuador’s prison system counts more than 37,000 inmates behind bars, with just 1,646 security staff, according to the government.

Lasso is pushing a plan to reduce prison violence, which includes pacifying gangs, pardoning criminals in special cases, repatriating foreign prisoners, and legal reform.

A week ago Lasso also extended a state of emergency to combat crime across the country.

(Reporting by Alexandra Valencia,; Writing by Oliver Griffin, Editing by Angus MacSwan)

Ecuador’s president declares 60-day state of emergency over rising crime

By Alexandra Valencia

QUITO (Reuters) – Ecuadorean President Guillermo Lasso late on Monday declared a state of emergency in the Andean country as part of a crackdown on the consumption and trafficking of drugs.

Lasso, a conservative who took office in May, said the move was a response to rising homicide figures nationwide and other crimes related to narcotic seizures, which total 147 tonnes so far this year.

“In the streets of Ecuador there is only one enemy: drug trafficking,” Lasso said in a television broadcast. “When drug trafficking grows so do assassinations and homicides, robberies of homes, vehicles, goods and people.”

“Our military and police forces will be felt strongly in the streets,” he said.

The 60-day state of emergency will allow the military to join drug and arms confiscation operations in nine of the country’s 24 provinces, including Guayas, home to major city Guayaquil, Lasso said. Patrols will take place 24 hours a day.

In the rest of the country, police will increase patrols and control efforts in public places.

More than 70% of violent deaths in the province of Guayas are “in some way” related to drug trafficking, Lasso said.

Violent deaths have also risen within prisons. Last month 119 people were killed in disturbances in a prison in Guayaquil, which the government has blamed on fighting between drug gangs.

Lasso said he would sponsor legislation to support security forces in efforts to combat crime and create an entity to defend officers prosecuted for “simply doing their duty.”

“This government will pardon all those who have been unjustly convicted for doing their job,” the president said, asking judges to “guarantee peace and order, not impunity and crime.”

(Reporting by Alexandra Valencia,; Writing by Julia Symmes Cobb, Editing by Steve Orlofsky)

Death toll in Ecuador prison riot rises to 116, six decapitated

QUITO (Reuters) -The death toll from a riot at one of Ecuador’s largest prisons rose to 116, President Guillermo Lasso said on Wednesday, adding that he would send additional security forces and free up funds to avoid a repeat.

Another 80 inmates were injured during the Tuesday night clashes at the Penitenciaria del Litoral in Guayas province, which has been the scene of bloody fights between gangs for control of the prison in recent months.

“It is unfortunate that criminal groups are attempting to convert prisons into a battleground for power disputes,” Lasso told reporters in Guayaquil, Ecuador’s largest city. “I ask God to bless Ecuador and that we can avoid more loss of human life.”

Tuesday’s clash was the most deadly act of violence ever reported in Ecuador’s penitentiary system. Similar clashes took place in February and July 2021 in various prisons throughout the country. At least 79 people died in the February violence, and in July at least 22 lives were lost.

Dozens of people arrived at the jail to seek information about relatives and demand accountability from officials responsible for the inmates’ safety. The government bolstered military presence outside the facility. Lasso said the state would assist the families of dead and injured inmates.

The South American country’s prosecutor’s office said earlier on Wednesday that six of the slain prisoners at Penitenciaria del Litoral had been decapitated.

The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) has previously condemned the violence, and Human Rights Watch urged Ecuador’s government to fully investigate the prison violence and bring those responsible to justice.

Lasso in August said the government would provide more funding for the overcrowded prison system to build new wards and install new equipment to improve security.

(Reporting by Alexandra Valencia in Quito; Editing by Bill Berkrot, Sam Holmes and Lincoln Feawst)

COVID still devastating in the Americas, health agency says

BRASILIA (Reuters) -COVID-19 continues to inflict a devastating toll on the Americas, with Argentina, Colombia, Cuba, Ecuador and Paraguay among the countries with the world’s highest weekly death rates, the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) said on Wednesday.

Cases have more than doubled in the United States over the past week, mainly among unvaccinated people, PAHO Director Carissa Etienne said in a briefing.

The more transmissible Delta variant of coronavirus has been detected in 20 of the 35 countries in the Americas already, she said.

Cuba is seeing higher COVID infection and death rates than at any other point in the pandemic there, she said, adding that more than 7,000 minors and nearly 400 pregnant women have tested positive there in the last week.

Over the last week there were over 1.26 million COVID-19 cases and nearly 29,000 deaths reported in the Americas.

Infection hotspots have been reported in Argentine provinces bordering Bolivia and Chile, and in Colombia’s Amazon region.

“As COVID continues to circulate, too many places have relaxed the public health and social measures that have proven effective against this virus,” Etienne said.

So far, only 16.6% of the population of Latin America and the Caribbean has been fully vaccinated against COVID-19, as countries in the regions have yet to access the vaccines needed to keep their people safe, she said.

“The good news is that vaccines work against the variants, including Delta, in terms of preventing severe disease and death. The bad news is that we do not have yet enough vaccines to stop community transmission,” Etienne said.

(Reporting by Anthony Boadle; Editing by Sandra Maler)

Season of discontent: protests flare around the world

Season of discontent: protests flare around the world
(Reuters) – Another day, another protest.

On Monday it was Bolivia – angry people clashed with police after the political opposition said it had been cheated in an election won by incumbent President Evo Morales.

Last week, the streets of the Chilean capital Santiago descended into chaos, as demonstrators enraged by a hike in public transport fares looted stores, set a bus alight and prompted the president to declare a state of emergency.

Earlier this month, Ecuador’s leader did the same after violent unrest triggered by the decision to end fuel subsidies that had been in place for decades.

And that was just South America.

Hong Kong has been in turmoil for months, Lebanon’s capital Beirut was at a standstill, parts of Barcelona resembled a battlefield last week and tens of thousands of Britons marched through London at the weekend over Brexit.

Protests have flared around the world in the last few months. Each has had its own trigger, but many of the underlying frustrations are similar.

Globalization and technological progress have, in general, exacerbated disparities within countries, said Sergei Guriev, former chief economist of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, while noting that not all of the current protests were driven by economic concerns.

Digital media has also made people more acutely aware of global inequalities, said Simon French, chief economist at UK bank Panmure Gordon.

“We know that the economics of happiness is largely driven by a relative assessment of your position versus your benchmark,” he said, a benchmark that now stretched way beyond the local community.

ECONOMICS

In at least four countries hit by recent violent protests, the main reason for the uprising is economic.

Governments in Chile and Ecuador have incurred their people’s wrath after trying to raise fares and end fuel subsidies.

As clashes engulfed Quito, Ecuadorean President Lenin Moreno reached out to indigenous leaders who had mobilized people to take to the streets.

Within minutes, chief protest organizer Jaime Vargas had rejected that outreach.

“We’re defending the people,” Vargas said in a live Facebook video from the march in Quito.

His response, visible to millions of people, underlines an added challenge authorities have when trying to quell dissent: social media has made communication between protesters easier than ever.

Tens of thousands of people have flooded Beirut in the biggest show of dissent against the establishment there in decades. People of all ages and religions joined to protest about worsening economic conditions and the perception that those in power were corrupt.

Similar factors were behind deadly civil unrest in Iraq in early October.

More than 100 people died in violent protests across a country where many Iraqis, especially young people, felt they had seen few economic benefits since Islamic State militants were defeated in 2017.

Security forces cracked down, with snipers opening fire from rooftops and the internet being shut to stem the flow of information among protesters.

GIVE US OUR AUTONOMY

Hong Kong has been battered by five months of often violent protests over fears Beijing is tightening its grip on the territory, the worst political crisis since colonial ruler Britain handed it back to China in 1997.

There have been few major rallies in recent weeks, but violence has escalated at those held, with militant activists setting metro stations ablaze and smashing up shops, often targeting Chinese banks and stores with mainland links.

Police have fired thousands of rounds of tear gas, hundreds of rubber bullets and three live rounds at brick- and petrol bomb-throwing activists.

The events in Hong Kong have drawn comparisons to Catalonia in recent days. There, too, people are angry at what they see as attempts to thwart their desire for greater autonomy from the rest of Spain, if not outright independence.

Protesters set cars on fire and threw petrol bombs at police in Barcelona, unrest sparked by the sentencing of Catalan separatist leaders who sought to declare an independent state.

Demonstrators also focused on strategic targets to cause maximum disruption, including the international airport, grounding more than 100 flights.

That came several days after similar action in Hong Kong, suggesting that protest movements are following and even copying each other on social media and the news.

“In Hong Kong they have done it well, but they are crazier,” said Giuseppe Vayreda, a 22-year-old art student at a recent Catalan separatist protest.

On Thursday, Hong Kong protesters plan a rally to show solidarity with those demonstrating in Spain.

LEADER OR NO LEADER

In some cases, individuals rise to the forefront of protest movements, using social media to get their message across.

In Egypt, where demonstrations last month were relatively small yet significant in their rarity, the catalyst of dissent against President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi was an Egyptian posting videos from Spain.

Greta Thunberg, a Swedish teenager, inspired millions of people to march through cities around the world in September to demand that political leaders act to stop climate change.

Tens of thousands gathered in a New York park to listen to her speech.

“If you belong to that small group of people who feel threatened by us, then we have some very bad news for you,” she said. “Because this is only the beginning. Change is coming whether they like it or not.”

(Reporting by Reuters correspondents; Additional reporting by Andrea Shalal and Heather Timmons in Washington; Writing by Mike Collett-White; Editing by Nick Tattersall and Sonya Hepinstall)

Strong quake in Peru kills one person, disrupts some oil operations

An aerial view shows a landslide caused by a quake in Yurimaguas, in the Amazon region, Peru May 26, 2019. REUTERS/Guadalupe Pardo

LIMA (Reuters) – A magnitude 8 earthquake killed one person, destroyed dozens of homes and disrupted some oil operations as it rocked Peru early on Sunday, authorities said.

The quake – the biggest to hit Peru since 2007 – was felt across the country and in neighboring Ecuador and Colombia after striking the sparsely-populated region of Loreto in Peru’s northern Amazon.

Peruvian President Martin Vizcarra said the hardest hit areas were the towns of Yurimaguas and Tarapoto.

“In reality, it’s affected all of the Peruvian jungle,” Vizcarra told journalists in broadcast comments as he surveyed the damage in Yurimaguas.

A 48-year-old man was killed in the region of Cajamarca after a boulder struck his home, emergency officials said. Peru’s National Emergency Center (COEN) said there were at least 11 people injured and more than 50 homes destroyed. Several schools, churches, hospitals and clinics were also damaged.

State-owned oil company Petroperu said the quake created a “minor” leak in a pipe at its Talara refinery on the Pacific coast that it said it has since controlled. It also suspended oil pumping at its Station 1 facility in Loreto in order to evaluate damage it detected there, it said in a statement.

Peru's President Martin Vizcarra accompanied by members of his cabinet speaks to the media before leaving for the area affected by earthquake, at the Jorge Chavez airport in Lima, Peru, May 26, 2019. Freddy Zarco/Courtesy of Bolivian Presidency/Handout via REUTERS

Peru’s President Martin Vizcarra accompanied by members of his cabinet speaks to the media before leaving for the area affected by earthquake, at the Jorge Chavez airport in Lima, Peru, May 26, 2019. Freddy Zarco/Courtesy of Bolivian Presidency/Handout via REUTERS

A spokeswoman for Canadian oil company Frontera Energy , which operates Peru’s largest oil block in of Loreto, said there were no damages to its installations.

TV images showed large fissures in a highway in Cajamarca and piles of mud and debris that had swept onto other roads.

Peru sits on the Pacific “Ring of Fire” where the majority of the world’s seismic activity occurs.

The quake on Sunday was rated as one of “intermediate depth” at around 110 kilometers (68 miles). Intermediate depth quakes typically cause less surface damage than shallower tremors.

The earthquake was around 75 km SSE of Lagunas and 180 km east of the town of Moyobamba, the USGS said.

There were local reports of electric power cuts in the cities of Iquitos and Tarapoto, Amazonian towns in the Loreto region of the country. Pictures and videos online also showed some cracked and damaged walls, homes shaking and a collapsed bridge.

In neighboring Ecuador, the quake was strongest near the Amazonian region of Yantzaza, causing momentary power outages.

Ecuadorian officials reported at least seven people injured, as well as mudslides and minor damage to homes. The country´s oil and mining infrastructure was operating normally, Ecuadorian Vice President Otto Sonnenholzner said on Twitter.

(Reporting by Marco Aquino and Mitra Taj in Lima; Writing by Adam Jourdan, Dave Sherwood and Mitra Taj; Editing by Keith Weir, Phil Berlowitz and Susan Thomas)

Earthquake along Ecuador’s coast kills one, destroys hotels

Map of location in Ecuador, center of earthquake

QUITO (Reuters) – A 5.8 magnitude earthquake shook Ecuador’s Pacific coast early on Monday, killing one person, injuring a dozen others and damaging hotels in the area, authorities said.

The country’s geological institute recorded the quake off the coast of Atacames in Esmeraldas province, northwest of Quito, the capital. The quake was followed by 15 lesser-magnitude aftershocks.

“We regret that a 75-year-old woman suffered a heart attack because of the quake,” national risk management secretary Susana Duenas told local radio. The health ministry said a dozen people were injured.

In a preliminary report, authorities said three hotels in the area, a popular tourist destination, were destroyed and other buildings sustained substantial damage.

President Rafael Correa was meeting with local officials in the area, which was devastated in a 7.8 magnitude quake earlier this year that killed about 670 people, displaced thousands and caused millions of dollars in damage.

Oil infrastructure in the area was unaffected by Monday’s quake, the state oil company Petroecuador said.

(Reporting by Alexandra Valencia; Writing by Julia Symmes Cobb; Editing by Dan Grebler)

Magnitude 6.4 quake strikes Ecuador’s northwest coast, no deaths reported

QUITO (Reuters) – A shallow earthquake with a magnitude of 6.4 struck Ecuador’s northwest coast on Sunday, in the region of April’s deadly quake, the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) said.

The quake was centered near the town of Esmeraldas, northwest of the capital Quito, at a depth of about 35 km (22 miles), the USGS said.

The Pacific Tsunami Warning Center did not issue a tsunami warning immediately after the quake.

President Rafael Correa said authorities had not received any reports of casualties or material damage.

“We must remain calm,” Correa said during a telephone call to a state-run television station.

“These are normal replicas, though the fear that people feel is understandable – especially the victims of the April 16 quake.”

The tremor was felt in Quito and the coastal business hub of Guayaquil, with residents streaming out of buildings into the streets, according to witnesses.

Calm quickly returned to both cities after residents saw that no damage had been done.

The coastal region has been hit by a series of quakes since the April 7.8 tremor that killed more than 650 people, the nation’s strongest quake in decades.

In May, two successive quakes measuring 6.7 and 6.8 in magnitude killed one person and caused minor damage.

(Reporting by Alexandra Valencia, Michael Perry and Mary Milliken Writing by Brian Ellsworth; Editing by Ryan Woo)