Washington reports that it will be sending security teams to Ecuador and increasing the presence of its FBI agents in the country, amidst the so-called “crisis of violence” that the South American nation is currently experiencing as a result of organized crime and drug trafficking.
“In the coming days, the FBI will increase its personnel in-country to support the Ecuadorian National Police and Attorney General’s Office,” reads part of the statement published by the White House this Monday, January 22. Likewise, the statement specified that the US will deliver to Quito “more than 20,000 bulletproof vests and more than a million dollars in security and emergency response equipment, including ambulances and defense logistical support vehicles.”
The announcement comes after the US special advisor for the Americas, Christopher Dodd, and the commander of the United States Southern Command, General Laura Richardson, met with Ecuadorian President Daniel Noboa to show Washington’s position on the crisis of security reported in Ecuador in recent weeks.
The Right Wing Always Manages to Rule Under a State of Exception
Meetings between US and Ecuadorian officials will continue in the coming days, and will include discussions on ways to deepen bilateral cooperation in areas such as security, anti-drug cooperation, migration, and economic development, according to the White House statement. Washington is also deploying personnel to Ecuador to support the ongoing training of police and prosecutors and strengthen their investigative capabilities, according to the Biden Administration.
Various social activists, politicians, and public opinion in general have expressed their concern that the United States will interfere in some way in Ecuadorian public policies, amid the violence experienced in the South American country. It would not be the first time that the White House and US security agencies have intervened in such a manner: it has already happened in Colombia and México, where, despite US aid and weapons, organized crime still operates as a de facto power. The US remains infamous for its interference and backing of popular suppression among countries of the Global South.
Former Ecuadorian president Rafael Correa has warned in a recent interview with Sputnik that in Ecuador there could be a kind of “Plan Colombia” in operation, in which US authorities will have great deal of interference in Ecuadorian internal affairs.
“We Latin Americans are specialists in denying the evidence, in believing the impossible,” Correa said. “When has US interference in these matters produced results? Colombia has seven American military bases and is the main drug producer in the world… I do fear a Plan Colombia in Ecuador, and I think that’s where they are going.”
Ecuador’s Constitutional Court gives green light to U.S.-Ecuador agreement to authorize presence of U.S. troops and Department of Defense (DoD) personnel.
Aircraft, ships and vehicles operated by the DoD may enter, exist and move freely through Ecuadorian territory. https://t.co/bRGyuIYUHq
— Camila (@camilapress) January 24, 2024
US troops
FBI agents were sent to Ecuador last August following the assassination of presidential candidate Fernando Villavicencio, allegedly to cooperate in his assassination investigation. So far, no clear results of that investigation have been brought to light as to who the intellectual masterminds of the political assassination may have been, and it resulted in a significant loss of popular support for Luisa González, the leftist presidential candidate belonging to the Citizen Revolution movement.
After the recently reported incidents of violence that have led to President Noboa’s declaration of a state of exception in Ecuador, a long-awaited project of bringing back US troops to Ecuador—years after President Correa ended US military presence in that country—is now becoming a reality.
Telesur journalist Elena Rodríguez Yánez reported this Wednesday, January 24, that the Ecuadorian Constitutional Court has officially greenlighted the presence of US troops and Department of Defense (DoD) personnel on the territory of the South American country. Aircraft, ships, and vehicles operated by the DoD will now be able to enter, exit, and freely move on Ecuadorian territory under the new Court ruling.
(Sputnik) with Orinoco Tribune content
Translation: Orinoco Tribune
OT/JRE/AU
