In a South American continent plagued by countless political upheavals, Ecuador has long appeared as a haven of peace. Today, residents are struggling to understand the surge of violence that has hit their country since the end of 2020. Caught between Colombia and Peru, two major cocaine producers, the smallest of the Andean countries has become the main export point for the white powder. And the scene of bloody struggles between rival criminal groups.
Ecuador is at the heart of the reconfiguration of global cocaine trafficking. This results from a rapid increase in global demand, the peace agreement signed in 2016 with the guerrillas of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia – the FARC, which until then controlled the coca market –, the disruption of circuits caused by the Covid-19 pandemic and the arrival of Mexican cartels, then the Albanian mafia.
Traffic takes place mainly by sea. Departing from the steep coves of the Pacific coast for small cargoes, from poorly monitored Ecuadorian ports for larger ones, hidden in containers bound for Europe. Cocaine and bananas often travel together.
Established in 2000, the dollarization of Ecuador has proven to be a boon for drug trafficking and money laundering – already facilitated by the corruption which is corrupting the country’s institutions. Prisons, transformed into operational centers for criminal organizations, have become the site of massacres: more than 450 inmates have died there since 2020. The violence then spread to ports and cities. The figures for homicides, kidnappings and extortion are on the rise throughout the country.
To overcome gangs, President Daniel Noboa declared on January 8, “the state of internal war” and designated twenty-two criminal organizations as “terrorists”. Since then, the army and police have increased operations in penitentiary centers and arrests in the poor neighborhoods of Ecuadorian cities. In three weeks, more than 4,000 people were arrested. Human rights organizations are worried, but the population approves of the firm policy of the young head of state, elected less than three months ago.
In the National Assembly and in the media, political leaders blame each other for the security crisis. Critics of former socialist president Rafael Correa (2007-2017) accuse him of having closed the American military base at Manta and of having secretly made pacts with criminal organizations. Corréists, for their part, consider that the return of neoliberalism, since 2018, has weakened the State, deregulated the financial system and impoverished the most deprived.
You have 15% of this article left to read. The rest is reserved for subscribers.