The decree signed on Sunday provides for the “mobilization” of the Police and the Armed Forces to “reinforce and restore order and control” of all prisons in the country.
The measure, which will last until December 29, was taken considering that “the serious internal commotion” that is going through the Ecuadorian prison system “unfortunately persists and continues to violate the lives and rights” of the inmates, the document states.
Lasso declared on September 29 a state of exception for 60 days in all prisons in Ecuador, after one of the worst prison massacres in Latin America in which 119 prisoners at the Guayas 1 penitentiary died.
At that prison mass, on November 14, 62 people died when inmates from one pavilion entered another to kill members of a rival gang using firearms, explosives, and machetes.
The massacre led to the replacement of the head of the joint command of the Armed Forces and the director of the agency in charge of prisons (SNAI).
The new decree of a state of exception indicates that “criminal organizations that operate inside the detention centers have sophisticated weapons and have demonstrated high levels of violence and cruelty.”
He adds that Ecuador, whose prisons are 30% overcrowded, has a deficit of 2,500 prison guides. There are currently only 1,646 for the entire country.
The Andean nation has 65 prisons with capacity for about 30,000 prisoners, but they are inhabited by 39,000. Of the total of inmates, 15,000 do not have a sentence.
Source From: Ambito
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