Ecuador: extension of the state of emergency in the face of violence linked to drug trafficking

Ecuadorian President Guillermo Lasso on Thursday renewed for another thirty days the state of emergency decreed in the country to deal with the increase in violence caused by drug trafficking, announced the General Secretariat of Communication.

The decree "

" in nine of the 24 provinces to complete the control functions of the national police in the areas of citizen security, internal protection and crime prevention, said a statement.

Read alsoObjective "total massacre": bloodbath in the largest prison in Ecuador

President Lasso declared a state of emergency on October 18 to fight the increase in crime linked to drug trafficking.

Initially planned for 60 days, the Constitutional Court limited its duration to 30 days.

In response, the president said the country was facing "

".

Between January and November this year, police seized 167 tons of drugs, 16 of which were in the last 30 days under state of emergency.

Located between Colombia and Peru, the world's main cocaine producers, and used as a transit zone for shipping to the United States and Europe, Ecuador, a country of 17.7 million people, is "

”, according to its president, by the drug trafficking mafias.

The homicide rate in the Andean nation fell from 7.8 per 100,000 in 2020 to 10.6 between January and October 2021, according to the government.

This violence has also reached prisons.

Last week, a massacre left 62 dead in a Guayaquil prison, where 119 people were previously killed in a September riot.