COURTESY TC / REUTERS
Armed men burst onto the set of a public television station in Guayaquil, in the southwest of the country, on January 9, briefly taking journalists and other channel employees hostage.
The prosecutor in charge of the investigation into the irruption of armed men live on the set of an Ecuadorian public television channel on January 9, briefly taking journalists and other employees hostage, was assassinated, a announced Wednesday January 17 the prosecution.
The live appearance of heavily armed men, threatening journalists and employees of the TC channel to the ground in Guayaquil (southwest), shocked the country faced with a wave of violence triggered by drug trafficking gangs. “They came in to kill us, my God protect us», One of the captive journalists had sent to an AFP correspondent, in a WhatsApp message. Complaints were audible in the background.
Amid the gunfire, the broadcast of these surreal images continued live for several minutes, despite the lights on the set going out and the camera freezing. Until apparently the intervention of the police with cries of “Police, police“. Thirteen attackers were arrested, without causing any casualties, and their faces presented to the press a few days later. According to the prosecution, the murdered prosecutor was in charge of determining which gang had carried out this assault.
Bullet impacts
Local media broadcast images of the prosecutor’s car with several bullet holes in the driver’s window. “In response to the murder of our colleague César Suarez (…) I will be categorical: organized crime groups, criminals and terrorists will not stop our commitment to Ecuadorian society“, Attorney General Diana Salazar said in a video posted on X.
This assault on a TV set occurred shortly after the escape of the feared leader of the Choneros gang, Adolfo Macias, alias “Fito », starting point of a new episode of violence in the country ravaged by drug trafficking. After Fito’s escape, several mutinies and hostage-taking of guards affected various prisons, relayed by frightening videos broadcast on social networks showing the captives threatened by the knives of masked inmates.
The gangs sowed terror in the country’s streets before more than 20,000 soldiers were sent to restore order, with Ecuadorian President Daniel Noboa declaring the country “in war“. More than 200 prison officials held hostage by mutineers were released. Violence in the country has left at least 19 dead. Ecuador, once a haven of peace, is ravaged by their violence after becoming the main export point for cocaine produced in neighboring Peru and Colombia. Murders in the streets increased by 800% between 2018 and 2023, from 6 to 46 per 100,000 inhabitants. In 2023, 7,800 homicides were recorded and 220 tonnes of drugs seized