Ecuador on Monday reported two assaults that left 14 individuals useless and 17 wounded, with a number of the victims exhibiting indicators of torture.
The South American nation is some extent of departure for cocaine shipments to america and Europe, and a hub for some 20 legal teams concerned in extortion and contract killings.
The primary assault occurred round 11 pm Sunday (0400 GMT) in Guayaquil, Ecuador’s largest metropolis and the capital of Guayas province.
As many as seven individuals acquired off bikes and pickup vans and fired photographs at a neighborhood soccer recreation, native police colonel Carlos Fuentes informed reporters.
The assault, which was attributed to the so-called Freddy Kruger gang, left six useless and 17 injured, together with three minors who have been on the sporting occasion.
Police additionally reported discovering eight our bodies within the city of Buena Fe, positioned within the southwestern province of Los Rios.
The victims, 4 males and 4 girls, had “indicators of torture” with their palms tied along with duct tape and “their heads coated in black luggage,” in line with an area police report.
Native media mentioned the group have been half of a bigger group of 12 who had traveled to the realm from the capital Quito. The opposite 4 members of the get together, an older girls and three women, stay lacking.
Ecuador recorded greater than 4,600 homicides within the first half of the yr, a 47% enhance from the identical interval of 2024, knowledge from the Ecuadoran Observatory of Organized Crime exhibits.
As soon as thought of one among Latin America’s most secure nations, Ecuador has seen a dramatic surge in violence in recent times as its location between two of the world’s largest cocaine producers, Colombia and Peru, has made it a serious transit hub for narcotics.
The nation has just lately been rocked by lethal jail assaults linked to drug gangs. Final month, officers mentioned 17 individuals have been killed in a riot in an Ecuadoran jail, with rampaging inmates beheading and maiming rivals.
Simply days earlier than that, 13 prisoners and a guard have been reported killed in southwest Ecuador. Officers mentioned the useless inmates belonged to the rival Los Choneros and Los Lobos gangs, two of the largest drug trafficking teams in Ecuador. The U.S. just lately designated each gangs as overseas terrorist organizations.
José Adolfo Macías Villamar, alias Fito, is the boss of the Los Choneros gang, and he was recaptured in June this yr, greater than a yr after escaping jail. He had been serving a 34-year sentence since 2011 for involvement in organized crime, drug trafficking and homicide.
In July, the Ecuadoran authorities extradited Fito to the U.S., the place he pleaded not responsible to expenses, together with worldwide cocaine distribution and smuggling firearms.
