(Durán) Five people were shot dead in Ecuador on Tuesday in a new armed attack amid a state of emergency imposed due to rising gang violence, police said.
“Police officers found four dead and one injured, who was transported to a medical center, where he is [mort] due to the seriousness of his injuries,” police told AFP, specifying that the five men “had gunshot wounds.”
The attack took place in the town of Durán, neighboring the port city of Guayaquil (southwest) and one of the centers of violence by criminal gangs.
According to police, “several individuals in two vehicles” got out of the cars and opened fire.
The coastal province of Guayas, where gangs linked to drug trafficking are waging a merciless war, is one of six Ecuadorian provinces where a state of emergency has been reinstated since the beginning of July following an upsurge in armed attacks.
In January, the escape of a gang leader from a high security prison triggered violent uprisings by drug trafficking groups, prison riots, attacks on the press, car bomb explosions, hostage of some 200 prison officers and police officers, as well as around twenty dead.
Engaged in a fight against drug trafficking gangs, Ecuadorian President Daniel Noboa then established a state of emergency, in force for the 90 days permitted by law, and declared the country in “internal armed conflict”.
Ecuador, once one of the most peaceful countries in the region, is now under the yoke of criminal gangs competing for drug trafficking routes.
Killings are becoming more and more frequent there with a homicide rate rising from 6 per 100,000 inhabitants in 2018 to 47 per 100,000 in 2023.
Situated between Colombia and Peru – the world’s two main producers of cocaine – the country of 17 million people has become a hub for shipping drugs to the United States and Europe.