International
Ecuadorian Ombudsman’s Office reports violent deaths of prisoners in prisons under military control
The Ombudsman’s Office of Ecuador issued a statement where it reported cases of violent deaths of prisoners in prisons under military control “with signs of alleged torture,” as well as warnings of deaths of prisoners due to malnutrition.
This report was issued by the Ombudsman’s Office after a judge ordered this institution to investigate the allegations of human rights violations filed by non-governmental organizations during the militarization of prisons ordered by the Government of President Daniel Noboa in the framework of the “internal armed conflict” that he declared against organized crime.
According to its report, the Ombudsman’s Office counted 24 deaths of prisoners in various prisons in the country between February 9 and March 7, 2024, “by natural deaths and in other cases by violent deaths, with indications of alleged torture. Likewise, there are alerts of the death of PPL (persons deprived of liberty) with signs of malnutrition.”
That record corresponds to the first of the three months that the state of emergency that Noboa decreed at the national level against criminal gangs lasted, and whose declaration of “internal armed conflict” remains in force, with which the Government has come to name these groups as terrorists and non-state belligerent actors.
“From the information collected by family members, people deprived of liberty, the media and civil society, the increase in deaths in the CPL (centers of deprivation of liberty) was identified, they are in the custody of the Armed Forces,” said the Ombudsman’s Office.
The institution that ensures the fulfillment of fundamental rights in Ecuador pointed out that it is constantly monitoring the prisons of the provinces of Esmeraldas, Santo Domingo, Carchi, Imbabura, Pichincha (whose capital is Quito), Cotopaxi, Sucumbíos and Napo, in which the food service was suspended since May 1.
Likewise, it echoed the journalistic reports that warn that the suspension of the food service will be extended to the province of Guayas, whose capital is Guayaquil, where the largest prison complex in the country is located, which with about 12,000 inmates, approximately a third of the country’s prison population.
“The authorities were aware of the possible risk of incidents in the centers due to food problems,” said the Ombudsman’s Office.
The SOS Cárceles Ecuador platform denounced the alleged death of an inmate from the Latacunga prison, in the province of Cotopaxi, for alleged malnutrition, information that so far has not been confirmed nor denied by the National Service of Integral Attention to Persons Deprived of Liberty (SNAI), the State’s prison agency.
The Government has attributed the suspension of the food service to an alleged link of the supplier company to organized crime, while the company has pointed out in the media that it registers a significant State debt.
In some prisons, the relatives of the prisoners have organized themselves to collect donations and provide food to their imprisoned relatives.
Ecuador’s prisons are one of the epicenters of Ecuador’s violence crisis, as many of them are under the control of criminal gangs, so Noboa went on to militarize them when he decreed a state of emergency at the national level at the beginning of the year.
Between 2020 and 2023, more than 500 prisoners were murdered within them, most of them in a series of bloody prison massacres due to disputes between rival gangs.
These gangs, mainly dedicated to drug trafficking, are credited with the swell of violence that plagues Ecuador and that has led it to be among the first countries in Latin America with the most homicides, with a rate of 47 per 100,000 inhabitants in 2023, according to the Ecuadorian Observatory of Organized Crime (OECO).
So far Noboa has closed ranks around state forces in the face of allegations of human rights violations during what the head of state has called a “war” on organized crime.
On Monday, the Deputy Minister of Government, Esteban Torres, rejected the letter sent by the organization Human Rights Watch (HRW) to Noboa in which he expressed to him that his evaluations of that first state of emergency determined that the declaration of “internal armed conflict” is not sufficiently motivated and that that measure contributed to serious human rights violations.
International
China shows at the UN its “condemnation” of Israel for the “violation of Iran’s sovereignty”
The Chinese ambassador to the United Nations, Fu Cong, showed the “condemnation” of his country against the “violation of the sovereignty, security and territorial integrity of Iran” after the air attack launched by Israel against multiple targets in that country, the official newspaper Diario del Pueblo reports this Saturday.
That media echoes Fu’s speech to the UN Security Council on Friday, in which he demanded that Israel “immediately stop all its military actions.”
“China (…) opposes the expansion of conflicts, and is deeply concerned about the serious consequences that may arise from Israel’s actions. The intensification of regional tensions does not interest any of the parties involved,” said the Chinese emissary.
Beijing called on Tel Aviv and Tehran to “resolve their disputes through political and diplomatic means, and maintain peace and stability at the regional level jointly.”
In Fu’s view, the Israeli attack will have a “negative impact” on the negotiations on Iran’s nuclear program: “China has always been committed to the peaceful resolution of the Iranian nuclear issue through dialogue and consultations, and opposes the use of force, illegal unilateral sanctions and armed attacks on peaceful nuclear facilities.”
This Friday, China had already expressed its willingness to “play a constructive role” to curb the escalation of tensions and facilitate conciliation, in line with its traditional position of active neutrality in the region’s conflicts.
The Israeli attack, which according to Tehran caused dozens of deaths, including senior military commanders and at least six nuclear scientists, targeted key facilities such as the uranium enrichment plant in Natanz. Numerous civilian casualties were also reported.
Israel justified the offensive by claiming that the Iranian regime is secretly developing a program to manufacture nuclear weapons.
For his part, Iran’s supreme leader, Ali Khamenei, promised a “severe response” and assured that the attack would reveal the “evil nature” of Israel.
UN Secretary-General António Guterres also expressed concern about the bombing, at a time when Iran and the US The United States is holding talks about the Iranian nuclear program.
International
Donald Trump’s government pauses its program of indiscriminate raides against migrants
The government of US President Donald Trump has decided to pause its campaign of discretionary roundings against migrants in certain areas due to its apparent concern about the growing unpopularity of these methods, according to The New York Times newspaper on Friday.
According to an email to which the newspaper has had access and the confirmation of US officials, the Executive has ordered the Immigration and Customs Control Service (ICE) to pause the beatings that affect the agricultural industry and the hospitality industry.
The spokeswoman for the Department of Homeland Security, Tricia McLaughlin, confirmed in a statement that “the president’s instructions” will be obeyed and the portfolio will also continue to “work to get the worst illegal foreign criminals out of the streets of the United States.”
The decision points out that this campaign of discretionary arrests to try to deport large-scale immigrants is harming industries and electoral constituencies whose support Trump wants to retain for next year’s legislative elections.
The new instructions were transmitted to ICE in an email sent last Thursday asking that “all investigations/law enforcement operations be suspended in work centers in the agricultural sector (including aquaculture and meat packing plants), restaurants and hotels.”
These new guidelines come in turn after more than a week of intense protests in Los Angeles against this immigration policy and that Trump himself admitted that the raids seem to be affecting the agricultural sector, which in states like California, where beatings have intensified, depend almost exclusively on immigrant labor.
Since his return to the White House in January, Trump has implemented an aggressive policy of hard hand against immigration and as a sample of his Cabinet officials recently held a meeting with the ICE leadership to order them to carry out 3,000 arrests a day, a mandate that seems to be behind the intensification of the raids.
International
Trump says he knew “everything” about the attack on Iran and assures that the dialogue remains open
US President Donald Trump said on Friday that Washington “known everything” about the Israeli attack on Iran and that the dialogue on Tehran’s nuclear program “is not dead.”
“We knew everything and I tried to avoid Iran all this humiliation and death. I tried hard to avoid it because I would have loved to see an agreement,” Trump said in an interview with Reuters.
The US president insisted on what he wrote today about the attack on social networks, where he said he gave an ultimatum of 60 days to Tehran to reach an agreement.
“We knew practically everything. We knew enough to give Iran 60 days to reach an agreement and today it is already 61 days,” he explained in the interview, in which he said he did not know what the current situation of the Iranian nuclear program is after the attack launched by Israel, which also ended the lives of key military leaders of the Persian country.
Regarding the dialogue between the US and Iran about the nuclear program of the ayatollahs, Trump assured that “he is not dead”, that “an agreement is still possible” and also recalled that on Sunday a sixth round of dialogue is scheduled in Muscat (Oman) that they consider is now in the air.
“We have a meeting with them on Sunday. Now, I’m not sure if that meeting will take place, but we have a meeting with them on Sunday,” he said.
The United States and Iran have held five rounds of talks on the Iranian nuclear program since April, with Washington demanding that Tehran discard its capabilities both to manufacture an atomic bomb and to enrich uranium, something that the ayatollahs considered unacceptable.
Both Israel and Trump himself had warned of possible preventive attacks on the Persian country due to this refusal by Iran.
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