Ecuadorian President Guillermo Lasso declared Thursday, July 22 a "state of emergency" in the country's prisons in order to
"restore order"
after riots that left 22 dead and sixty wounded, according to a latest official report .
From the province of Cotopaxi (center), where the majority of victims were registered, President Lasso declared
"a state of emergency in the prison system in order to mobilize all the human and economic resources necessary to restore order"
in prisons across the country.
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"We are going to begin a process of total restructuring of the prison system
,
"
said the head of state, who replaced the director of the prison administration with a soldier.
He announced that the military will now be responsible for controlling access to prisons, while the police will guard the interior.
Until now, the security of prisons has been ensured by civilian prison guards.
Earlier in the day, the prison administration had suspended certain activities
"which could endanger the prison population and administrative officials"
.
According to a source with the administration, visits have been suspended in some establishments.
Decapitated corpses
In February, gang clashes over control of the country's main prisons resulted in the deaths of 79 inmates in a single day.
This violence was marked by terrible scenes, with beheaded corpses, revealing the power of drug trafficking gangs in these overcrowded establishments.
According to the governor of Cotopaxi, Oswaldo Coronel, on Wednesday, the rioters
"used large caliber firearms, as well as explosives which caused extensive damage inside the penitentiary"
.
Prisoners managed to escape Thursday at dawn.
78 of them were caught by the police but it is not known how many detainees are still at large.
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Ecuador has around 60 penitentiary centers with a capacity of 29,000 places. Overcrowding is around 30%, with 38,000 detainees, watched by 1,500 guards while, according to experts, it would take 4,000 for effective control. According to the Defender of the People, there were
"103 assassinations"
in Ecuadorian prisons in 2020. In an attempt to counter the violence in prison, ex-President Lenin Moreno, replaced in May by Guillermo Lasso, had decreed several times 'state of exception, especially in 2020 for three months. Since the start of the pandemic, Ecuador has used alternative sentences for minor offenses to reduce its prison population and thus reduced prison overcrowding from 42% to 30%.
