Noboa issued the executive order in response to a series of coordinated attacks that swept through Ecuador on Tuesday, terrorizing citizens and paralyzing cities. A group of armed men took over a television station during a live broadcast, and held its employees hostage at gunpoint. There were more than 30 car explosions across the country, riots broke out in several prisons, and at least seven police officers were kidnapped. In Guayaquil, the largest city in Ecuador and the epicenter of the violence, four people were killed by gunmen who opened fire on them randomly while they were walking in the streets, according to the city's police chief. Dozens of prison guards remain held hostage in four prisons across the country.
Noboa said the attacks followed the escape of the country's most notorious gang leader, Jose Adolfo “Vito” Macias Villamar, who received leaked information that the government was planning to transfer top gang leaders to high-security prison wards. Government officials indicated that this step may have led to the attacks.
Noboa said the government is now waging a battle against criminal organizations with more than 20,000 members, groups that have now become “military targets.”
Tuesday's chaos – and Noboa's stunning declaration of armed conflict – marks a turning point in a mounting security crisis over the past four years that analysts describe as one of the worst in Latin America in more than a decade. The never-ending global demand for cocaine has helped turn this small country into a crucial transit point for drugs and a bloody battleground for cartels.
By cooperating with international cartels, the gangs gain power and create chaos. Deadly prison riots, widespread extortion, kidnapping, and car bombs. Assassination of a presidential candidate. The violence has drawn comparisons to the worst days of Pablo Escobar's decades-old drug terrorism in neighboring Colombia and a gang violence attack in Sao Paulo, Brazil, in 2006.
The army and police had arrested 329 “terrorists” as of Wednesday afternoon and killed five, according to the head of the Joint Command of the Armed Forces, Jaime Patricio Villa. In addition, Noboa said that 1,500 foreign national prisoners would be deported to countries including Colombia and Venezuela.
“We will consider that the judges and prosecutors who support the identified leaders of these terrorist groups are also part of the terrorist groups,” Noboa said.
Hugo Acero Velasquez, a former official, said the president's order “conflates armed conflicts with crime” and applies a terrorist classification that Colombia also uses to describe its armed groups and insurgencies, especially after the September 11, 2001 attacks in the United States. Security Secretary in Bogotá, Colombia, who advises mayors in Ecuador. But rarely has the Latin American government officially designated non-rebellious criminal gangs as terrorists and declared an internal conflict against them, applying international laws of war.
Juan Baber, deputy director of Human Rights Watch in the Americas, called Noboa's announcement “highly questionable” from a legal standpoint and “possibly a recipe for disaster.”
Under international law, a declaration of armed conflict requires two things: a certain level of hostility or combat on the part of an armed group; The level of organization of that group, such as chain of command and headquarters. Papier claims that the Ecuadorian government has not provided evidence that meets both requirements, and in fact appears to be “ignoring” them.
“This opens the door to all kinds of violations,” including “arbitrary arrests and extrajudicial executions committed with complete impunity,” Papier said.
Noboa's reaction reflects the influence of what some have described as the “Bukele effect,” the controversial approach adopted by El Salvador's president to combat gangs in that country. Countries in the region increasingly rely on emergencies and expanded military forces to resolve security crises.
“I think this is a broader reflection of the inability of many Latin American governments to find effective solutions to organized crime,” Babier said.
Fernando Bastias, a human rights defender in Guayaquil, said he believed the Constitutional Court would intervene and block the president's order.
“How do you differentiate between who belongs to one gang and who belongs to another gang?” Asked. “What you are doing is endangering the rights of the civilian population, people who had nothing to do with anything, but now they will participate in a war called for by the state.”
Gen. Victor Herrera, police chief of the Guayaquil region, said the presidential order was an important step. In the next 60 days, he said in an interview with The Washington Post, authorities aim to target the logistics and financing of gangs that profit from drug trafficking, extortion and illegal mining. Authorities will also focus on dismantling arms and explosives smuggling networks entering through Peru. Herrera said several criminal groups were involved in this week's attacks, especially Los Tijerones and the country's largest and most dangerous gang, Los Lobos.
Bastias said Guayaquil remained paralyzed with fear a day after the attacks across the city. His mother was stopped and held at gunpoint while driving on Tuesday, and was only released after she told the armed men she lived in the neighborhood. Bastias's colleagues were stuck all over the city, unable to return home for hours as public services were closed, schools closed, and taxis became impossible to find.
“Everyone ran home,” Bastias said. “It was a moment of chaos and fear, and we realized that this crisis had reached a new stage of violence.”
On Wednesday afternoon, the sidewalks near the National Assembly in Quito were empty of tourists, and most shops were closed. Every few blocks, police would stop cars to check for explosives and drugs. Around Carondelet Palace – where the president lives – the streets were blocked by soldiers wearing helmets and holding rifles.
“It's the first time in my life I've seen something like this – there are no people in the street; “We're caught in bombs,” Melonie Carrera, a 30-year-old tour guide, said in an empty square. She feared the tourists had already left.
Within a few days, everything changed for 21-year-old Joseph Alvear. A personal trainer in Quito, he saw the streets fall silent on Tuesday as civilians were told to shelter in their homes after the president declared war.
It is a two-hour drive to and from Valle de los Chilos, where Alvear lives with his parents and his 23-year-old brother, who was told on Tuesday that his university courses will now be held online. Alvear said the road to Quito was a highway full of fear and despair and full of people “scared trying to escape.” There were accidents and cars stopping. Alvear said he will leave his job soon, because traveling by bus is too dangerous to continue.
“Imagine if the terrorists won,” Alvear said. “What will happen? We are in free fall.”
Schmidt reported from Bogotá. Ana Vanessa Herrero in Caracas, Venezuela, contributed to this report.
