Quito, Jan 17 (EFE).- The Ecuadorian public prosecutor who was investigating an armed group’s attack on a Guayaquil-based television station was shot and killed on Wednesday, in the port city of Guayaquil.
The Attorney General’s Office confirmed the death of prosecutor César Suárez, who days earlier had interrogated the thirteen detainees who on Jan. 9 burst into the TC Televisión station and held its employees hostage for several hours during a live broadcast.
According to local media, Suárez was followed by unknown assailants as he left the prosecutor’s office on Wednesday and was gunned down while driving his car in a northern neighborhood of Ecuador’s largest city.
Suárez was in charge of cases related to drug trafficking, terrorism and organized crime, and had publicly asked for police protection in an interview with El Universo newspaper on Tuesday.
The gunmen who stormed the canal allegedly belonged to the Los Tiguerones criminal gang, police said. Of the detainees, eleven adult men were taken into preventive custody, while the two minors were sent to a detention center.
State Attorney General Diana Salazar deplored the murder of her assistant and said her office would not cease its fight against organized crime groups.
“This heinous crime sends a message about the work we do in Ecuador’s justice system,” but “organized crime groups, criminals and terrorists will not stop our commitment to Ecuadorian society,” the prosecutor said.
She also called on law enforcement agencies to “guarantee the safety” of public officials, as well as on the Judicial Council to approve the possibility for prosecutors of the units against organized crime to conduct judicial hearings “electronically.”
Salazar said that the Attorney General’s Office has begun the initial investigation into Suárez’s murder, and after expressing condolences to his family, assured that his legacy will accompany the Attorney General’s Office’s fight against crime.
On Jan. 9, violence erupted in different parts of Ecuador: prisoners were taken hostage in prison riots, police officers were kidnapped and murdered, explosives were detonated, vehicles were burned, and, as mentioned, a television station was taken over by an armed group.
The unrest occurred as Ecuador’s President Daniel Noboa prepared to implement an “Iron Fist” plan to regain control of the country’s penal system, which is controlled by organized crime gangs and where more than 450 prisoners have been killed since 2020 in a series of prison massacres between rival factions.
The gang wars have also spilled over into the streets, making Ecuador one of the most violent countries in the world in recent years, with about 45 intentional homicides per 100,000 people in 2023, and even a presidential candidate, Fernando Villavicencio, assassinated.
In an unprecedented move, Noboa responded by declaring an “internal armed conflict” that allows him to use the Army to fight organized crime mafias, mainly dedicated to drug trafficking, which he described as terrorist groups and belligerent non-state actors.
Although the situation had calmed down and Ecuadorians were trying to return to normality, on Tuesday a prison guard was murdered in the Amazonian province of Sucumbíos, and on Wednesday prosecutor César Suárez was killed. EFE
fgg/ics
