Ecuador: how much will peace cost?
Here I reported briefly, seeking immediacy, the latest events until late Tuesday afternoon in this Latin American nation, where not only a state of emergency is in force but also the existence of an "internal armed conflict" has been declared, a category that is debatable from a legal point of view but whose recognition implies the deployment of exceptional resources to combat organized crime. The problem here is how many innocent lives will have to be lost for Ecuador to return to being a country with acceptable levels of security, of self-confidence, without impunity. That is to say, assuming that there is a capacity to repel the forces of evil firmly—in the early hours of yesterday morning, police officers had to retreat when they tried to enter a prison, faced with the firepower of the inmates—, what is the cost to be paid by the citizenry in case the criminal gangs decide to take it as a shield or bargaining chips? Will there be a country left if the battle to eradicate this septicemia that eats away at its foundations is indeed fought?
In Guayas, a coastal state where the violence emerging from drug trafficking has metastasized, some ten people died yesterday, including two policemen who were "viciously murdered by armed delinquents" in the canton of Nobol. In the afternoon, a television station was assaulted while broadcasting live programming, in a surreal event that fortunately resulted in the apprehension of the 13 insolent criminals who carried out the action, with no consensus in the reports on social networks when it came to pointing out the criminal group to which they belonged. In the decree declaring the existence of an "internal armed conflict", Noboa singled out some twenty organizations as terrorists, including the most conspicuous ones such as Los Choneros, Los Lobos, and Los Tiguerones. According to the Armed Forces commander, all of these are now "military objectives". "No act of terror will make us give up. We will not back down or negotiate. Good, justice, and order cannot ask for permission or bow their heads to terrorists", he affirmed. The executive branch maintains that its security announcements—which include the construction of a new Bukele-style prison—were the trigger for this wave of terror.
The Army is deployed both outside and inside the prisons, trying to tame a prison system that has been out of control for years (source).The whereabouts of Adolfo Macias, alias "Fito," and Fabricio Colon Pico, leaders of Los Choneros and Los Lobos, respectively, are still unknown. Fito would have fled "hours before" an operation was deployed to transfer him from his "low-security prison"—a nonsense—, while Colón Pico, together with other prisoners, took advantage of the embarrassing inability or complicity of the police to flee, when he had been arrested last Friday. Every minute that these subjects spend outside the penitentiary system is an affront and an open challenge to the power of the State, it takes away its entity and capacity of representation, while at the same time, it is a sword of Damocles over every citizen, including the president himself. Because I am convinced that organized crime can attempt against the life of Noboa himself, not to mention other officials. "I am still in shock", said the head of the television station that was assaulted yesterday. "Everything has collapsed. ... All I know is that it's time to leave this country and go very far away". Amid the state of emergency, the Police and the Armed Forces have achieved certain results, some more relevant than others, like this one, but I still don't see them deployed with the necessary strength and intelligence to give the precise and surgical blows demanded by the situation.
Material seized from a single individual who intended to attack a police station (source).Some 140 agents and service personnel of the penitentiary system were held by the rebelled inmates yesterday in several prisons. On my account, only three of the seven police officers who were kidnapped between Monday and Tuesday have been released, although the circumstances under which they were recovered remain unclear. Today, the capture of seven individuals linked to these actions was reported, as well as that of the alleged perpetrator of the murder of the policemen in Nobol. Something that strikes me when seeing the images of those apprehended is their relative youth. Metaphorically I could say that many are in the adulthood of childhood, which denotes a major defeat of the last governments—after Correa—in educational and social matters in general. This is the dimension that is always missing in the security strategies that have been followed in countries like El Salvador, focused on attacking what comes to the surface—the young delinquent, for example—and not the root of the problem, which is the lack of incentives, opportunities, and context that make them emerge. Finally, for the moment, it should be noted that instability has also had an impact on the measurement of country risk. The nation's sovereign bonds plunged. The 2035 one fell to 36.25 cents on the dollar, the 2030 followed that trend to 48.25, as the 2040 went down half a cent to 32.5 cents. I will update the situation as verified and relevant information comes in.
The quick regional roundup
Be a white collar. That's all it takes to avoid jail time in corrupt Peru. Kenji Fujimori, son of the controversial former president you know, received yesterday the confirmation of his four and a half year sentence for a corruption case, but since his sentence is less than five years, he receives the benefit of not being imprisoned under a law graciously issued less than two months ago by the also disputed President Dina Boluarte. Alberto's son sought to buy votes in 2018 from parliamentarians to prevent the legislature from dismissing then-president Pedro Kuczynski, the same who had granted his father's pardon a year earlier. All the Fujimoris have been sentenced or are in the middle of judicial processes for acts of corruption. By the way, in the general order, the context is marked by crossed accusations within the same justice system, and between it and the Executive, for that kind of acts. Someone is lying, if not all.
Patricia Bullrich, head of the security portfolio of the Argentine Government announced yesterday a series of measures aimed at "deactivating" the death threats received by the Governor of Santa Fe, in principle received from the prisons, which, paradoxically in Latin America, far from containing criminals in their domains, are a source of even worse dangers for society. Following the threats ("Pullaro, don't mess with ward 9. Just as we killed a policeman, we are going to kill your family," said one of the messages circulated), his wife and children have left the city of Rosario, which is reported to be bent to organized crime. The "high-risk program" promoted by the Executive contemplates that the "maximum security prisoners will be isolated and will not be able to have any kind of contact with anyone until these issues are clarified".
Mexico, always Mexico. Authorities in the state of Querétaro reported the unfortunate discovery of nine bodies—with signs of violence—inside two vehicles abandoned near a pipeline and "a luxury subdivision". The police chief in the town of San Juan del Rio said the Army located the bodies early Tuesday morning while patrolling a community where there is a golf course and a hotel. However another wire said the abandoned vehicles were informed by residents. There were no reports of missing persons with the characteristics of the bodies, so it could be a conflict between those who steal fuel, a serious problem that although it has been firmly attacked by the current administration is still latent, and generating tragedies like this one. Last year, some 5,600 illegal taps were found.
And this is all for our report today. I have referenced the sources dynamically in the text, and remember you can learn how and where to follow the LATAM trail news by reading my work here. Have a nice day.
