Quito, Sep 4 (EFE). – Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced in Quito that the United States designated on Thursday the Ecuadorian criminal gangs Los Lobos and Los Choneros as terrorist groups.
These are the two largest and most powerful criminal gangs in Ecuador, which the government of President Daniel Noboa already declared as terrorists in early 2024, along with other groups responsible for an unprecedented escalation of violence in the country.
The designations of Los Lobos and Los Choneros brings “all sorts of options in the United States to work in conjunction with the government of Ecuador in the future to stamp these groups out,” Rubio said alongside Ecuador’s Foreign Minister Gabriela Sommerfeld, following a meeting with Noboa.
The Secretary of State announced that Washington will provide 13.5 million dollars in funding to support the Ecuadorian government’s efforts to combat organized crime.
He noted that an additional 6 million dollars was approved for state-of-the-art drones for the Ecuadorian Navy.
Before Thursday’s designation, the US government had imposed economic sanctions on Los Choneros, specifically targeting its leader, the drug trafficker José Adolfo Macías Villamar (“Fito”), recently extradited to face drug trafficking charges.
Macías Villamar was the first Ecuadorian to be extradited to the United States since the country allowed its citizens to be handed over to US authorities again after a recent constitutional reform via referendum.
After escaping from prison for the second time while serving a sentence imposed in 2011 for drug trafficking, organized crime, and murder, the drug kingpin became the country’s most wanted criminal and one of the main targets of the Noboa administration.
Sommerfeld anticipated that the meeting would discuss modernizing the extradition treaty between the United States and Ecuador.
Additionally, Rubio said he does not believe military attacks, such as the one carried out on a boat allegedly transporting drugs from Venezuela this week, will be necessary in “friendly countries” like Ecuador because they cooperate.
The Ecuadorian government has intensified its fight against organized crime, maintaining that the country is in a state of “internal armed conflict” with criminal gangs. Ecuador has aligned with Washington in designating the Tren de Aragua (TDA) and the Cártel de los Soles, both of which are Venezuelan, as terrorist organizations.
Rubio’s trip comes at a time marked by the recent attack on a boat that departed from Venezuela. According to Washington, the boat belonged to the TDA and was transporting a shipment of drugs. The attack was carried out by the large military contingent that the US has deployed in the southern Caribbean. EFE
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