Government Ecuador, after riots in a prison in Guayaquil Where 118 deaths have been reported at the present time, the state of exception was declared in the prison system and the opportunity for the army and police to enter those centers, with the aim of dismantling the violent gangs that waged a war to control prisons. .
Behind the brawl on Tuesday in Prison No. 1 in Guayaquil, at least 118 prisoners were killed and 80 others were injured, as confirmed tonight by the President of Ecuador himself, Guillermo Laso, who avoided accepting that control of the prison has already been taken back.
“Declare a state of exception due to serious internal disturbances in all centers of deprivation of liberty comprising the social rehabilitation system at the national level, without any exception, for a period of 60 days from the date of signing this Executive Decree,” says the signed document Lasso.
I just decreed a state of exception for the entire prison system nationwide.
In Guayaquil, I will chair the Security Committee to coordinate the necessary measures to control the state of emergency, ensuring the human rights of all concerned. pic.twitter.com/2gdZ0pLlZW
– Guillermo Lasso (@LassoGuillermo) September 29, 2021
The President stressed that a plan will be presented to try to solve the phenomenon of violence in the country’s prisons. The plan will include significant investments in infrastructure and technological surveillance and monitoring systems, which will help the authorities to avoid the riots and quarrels that have been going on for several years now.
National Service for the Comprehensive Care of Persons Deprived of Their Liberty and Adolescent Offenders (SNAI), who is responsible for the country’s prison system, will receive the necessary resources to implement this plan, as a priority in the Guayaquil prison, according to the head of state.
Contact with cartels
This statement was made by Lasso in a press conference in which he warned the resigned Director of the National Security Directorate, Fausto Cobo, of the power of gangs operating inside prisons, where explosives and heavy-caliber weapons are used.
Cobo, who resigned last Monday as director of SNAI and was replaced by Bolivar Garzón, who was serving as director of the prison in the city of Latacunga, where they were also recorded violent clashes between inmates.
Relatives of deceased prisoners wait outside the mortuary to deliver the bodies of inmates who were murdered in Guayaquil Prison (Ecuador). / Marcus PIN (EFE)
Gangs operating in prisons, which would be linked to drug cartels, especially in Mexico, according to Cobo, have “power equal or higher” to the state.
Measures against violence
For this reason, he noted that the government has taken measures to try to mitigate and eliminate violence in prisons, particularly the state of exception that allows for urgent and rapid measures.
According to the executive decree signed by President Lasso, the state of exception provides for the national mobilization of all organs of the public administration, in particular the national security apparatus, the armed forces and the police, so that “efforts are coordinated with a view to implementing the necessary measures. To restore and maintain order, and to prevent new social violence incidents within the centers “.
The decree adds that in the event of serious incidents occurring inside prisons, the “police in coordination with the armed forces must” urgently intervene, within the current constitutional and legal framework, and with regard to human rights.”
It also states that the participation of the armed forces must respect standards of “necessity, reasonableness and proportionality.”
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