QUITO, (Reuters) – At least 10 people were killed in violence at a prison in Ecuador’s capital Quito yesterday, the prisons agency said, after authorities moved two gang leaders to a maximum security facility.
Authorities have been moving prisoners considered to be gang leaders to new facilities in a bid to help reduce violence in the country’s chaotic jails. Ecuador’s prison system has faced structural problems for decades, but jail violence has soared since late 2020, killing at least 400 people and terrorizing inmates’ families.
At least five police officers were killed earlier this month in attacks in reaction to the transfer of about 1,000 prisoners, while at least two inmates died in related violence.
The attorney general’s office said on Twitter on Friday that it had opened an investigation into the deaths of nine people at the El Inca prison in the capital. The SNAI prison authority confirmed at least 10 prisoners had died.
The violence took place after the transfers of ‘Bermudez’ from Los Lobos gang and ‘Anchundia’ from the R7 gang, who authorities say are gang leaders responsible for recent violence in prisons in Quito and Santo Domingo respectively.
President Guillermo Lasso has repeatedly accused gangs of using violence to retaliate against his government’s efforts to combat them. Ecuador is used as a transit point for drugs bound for Europe and the United States.
“The government acts with all the rigor of the law to sanction the leaders of narco-terrorist mafias that provoke attacks, that’s why those who cause problems will be transferred to the maximum security prison,” Lasso’s office said in an earlier statement.
Three more leaders from Los Lobos, who have been identified as the masterminds of the violence in the Quito prison, will also be moved to the maximum security facility, the government said in a later statement.
SNAI reopened the maximum security La Roca prison in Guayaquil for gang leaders this year.
UWI, bank sign US$10m grant agreement on flood mitigation
(Trinidad Guardian) The University of the West Indies (UWI) and the CAF Development Bank of Latin America have signed a US$10M Grant agreement for flood mitigation. According to a press release from the UWI, the university will be responsible for receiving the funds and implementing the project. Specifically, The UWI Engineering Institute of the Faculty of Engineering is the Technical/ Project Management arm for this project, while the St. Augustine Centre for Innovation and Entrepreneurship (STACIE) will provide administration and contract management.
Funding of US$10 million was provided by the Adaptation Fund for the Trinidad and Tobago: Multisectoral Adaptation Measures to Climate Change in the South Oropouche River Basin for Flood Relief project, a release from UWI said yesterday. CAF is acting as the accredited Regional Implementation Entity. The technical cooperation will support the Ministry of Planning and Development of Trinidad and Tobago with resources for financing the Flood Mitigation Project.
The release said that UWI is the Executing Entity, responsible for receiving the funds and implementing the project.
The Project’s specific objectives are to:
Strengthen territorial planning and risk management;
Strengthen grey and green infrastructure to increase resilience of vulnerable population due to floods, sea level rise, and droughts;
Enhance the vulnerable coastal and wetland ecosystem of the South Oropouche River Basin (SORB) with EbA measures to restore key habitats such as mangrove areas on the coast and wetlands in the Godineau Swamp;
Increase adaptive capacity and diversity livelihoods of vulnerable fisherfolk and farmers to respond to increase climate risks like flooding, saltwater intrusion, and drought;
Raise awareness and build capacities of the stakeholders of SORB to promote knowledge management among government institutions, community members, vulnerable groups, private sector in climate resilient solutions.
