MADRID, 16 (EUROPA PRESS)
The president of Ecuador, Guillermo Lasso, announced this Monday that the Armed Forces and the National Police will be in charge of “maintaining order and security within and outside the prison system indefinitely”, with the military being permanently in prisons with reason for the prison crisis caused by the riots.
This is what the president has advanced in a press conference after a meeting with the representatives of the State, in which they have reached several agreements to carry out “joint actions” with the aim of “providing a comprehensive response to citizens”, reports the Ecuadorian newspaper ‘El Universo’.
The president has assured that the work of the Army and the National Police in the prisons will be carried out “in accordance with the Constitution and the law” and has called to be “united in the face of this problem”, “one of the biggest crises of the last decades in Ecuador “.
For this reason, in his appointment with the Armed Forces, the Legislative, Judicial or the Prosecutor’s Office, a total of six agreements have been registered, including “initiating a process of pacification through dialogue and with the support of civil society.”
Also, a draft law on Citizen Defense, prepared by the Minister of Government and the Prosecutor’s Office, will be sent to the National Assembly, while more agile actions will be coordinated with the Council of Justice and the Constitutional Court, the Ecuadorian media collects. ‘The Telegraph’.
Regarding the agreements, the Constitutional Court has authorized the presence of the military only outside the prisons, so it must be addressed how the measure will be carried out.
For its part, the Council for Citizen Participation and Social Control (CPCCS) will promote dialogue tables for reparation to victims who wish to do so and, on the other hand, inmates with catastrophic illnesses will be pardoned, in addition to accelerating investigations regarding these events.
The president has insisted that the “only way” to “defeat this enemy” is the “unity of the Ecuadorian people and with the Constitution in hand”, as well as he has urged to “face together” this “global problem”. The “national agreement” has the support of civil society and international organizations.
In this context, before the announcement, the Government of Ecuador has deployed 3,000 soldiers and another thousand police officers to the Litoral Penitentiary in Guayaquil this Monday, the scene this weekend of a new riot that has so far left 62 prisoners dead and more than forty injured.
According to the investigation, the inmates of ward three attacked those of number two, while those of seven, eight and nine, did the same against those of the transitory area.
The families of the prisoners have denounced the ineffectiveness of the authorities, whom they accuse of having intervened too late and have not ruled out taking legal action. At the moment, only half of the dead in this prison, which houses some 8,000 detainees, have been identified.