Status: 09.01.2024, 22:30 p.m.
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A group of gunmen broke into the studio in Ecuador during a live broadcast and threatened staff, footage shows.
Guayaquil – In Ecuador, armed and partially masked men stormed the state television station TC in Guayaquil on Tuesday (9 January) during a live broadcast. As live footage showed, they took several journalists and other staff hostages. "Don't shoot, please don't shoot," one woman shouted as gunshots rang out as men armed with rifles and grenades beat people in the TV studio, forcing them to the ground.
Gunmen storm live broadcast in Ecuador: "Have an injured colleague"
The live broadcast was not interrupted even though the lights went out on set. About 30 minutes after the gunmen appeared, the police could be seen arriving. "Police, police," shouted a man in uniform. "We have an injured colleague," one man said.
"They came to kill us. God, don't let that happen. The criminals are on the air," one of the journalists said in a Whatsapp message to the AFP news agency.
Police said units in Quito and Guayaquil had been informed of the "criminal act" and had already arrived on the scene.
Drug lord breaks out of prison: Ecuador in a state of emergency
The incident came a day after a nationwide state of emergency was declared in Ecuador following the prison break of a notorious drug lord. For the next 60 days, the military will be deployed in the country's prisons and streets, and there will be a nightly curfew between 23 p.m. and 5 a.m. Following the announcement, at least four police officers were kidnapped.
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The influential gang leader José Adolfo Macías, alias "Fito", escaped from the maximum security prison in the port city of Guayaquil on Sunday. Ecuador's President Daniel Noboa said he wanted to use the state of emergency to ensure that the armed forces had "full political and legal support" in the fight against drug-related crime.
Noboa was elected in October and had announced that he would fight drug-related crime and violence in the South American country, which in recent years has become a major hub for cocaine trafficking in the United States and Europe. (AFP)