Ecuador’s raid on Mexican Embassy triggers outrage across Latin America
Ecuadorian President Daniel Noboa, in an unprecedented move, ordered raids on the Mexican Embassy in early April to arrest Jorge David Glas, a former Vice-President in the administration of leftist former President Rafael Correa, receiving condemnation fr
political and diplomatic chasm has split Latin America, with the epicentre of the crisis lying in Ecuador’s capital Quito. Ecuadorian President Daniel Noboa, in an unprecedented move, ordered raids on the Mexican Embassy in early April to arrest Jorge David Glas, a former Vice-President in the administration of leftist former President Rafael Correa.
Mr. Glas had sought shelter at the Embassy since December, a month after Mr. Noboa came to power, and was later given political asylum by Mexico. The raid was an “exceptional decision,” taken “to protect national security, the rule of law and the dignity of a population that rejects any type of impunity for criminals, corrupt people or narco-terrorists,” Mr. Noboa said.
Critics say the raids are partly designed to boost Mr. Noboa’s image and yield short-term political gains. The young President is facing criticism for being unable to control crime, and has rallied support for a military crackdown on gang violence, the fate of which will be decided through a referendum on April 21.
The raids, however, have earned Mr. Noboa international
Aopprobrium for violating international laws. Mexico has broken diplomatic relations with the South American nation and plans to appeal at the International Court of Justice that Ecuador be suspended from the United Nations — unless it extends an apology.
The politics of Ecuador is tied to the security and safety of Ecuadorians. The once-peaceful Andean nation of 18 million people has seen crime and gang violence explode since 2016. Ecuador, because of its geography and permeable borders, sits as a transit hub for drugs moving from Colombia and Peru.
Ecuador was by 2019 among the top exporters of cocaine to the world, and within its borders, sheltered at least three major international crime groups. According to government estimates, almost 40,000 drug gang members operate in the country, equal to the number of soldiers in Ecuador’s army.
Mr. Glas, who was in power from 2013 to 2017, was previously convicted of taking bribes in a scandal involving the construction giant Odebrecht. He also faces legal proceedings for alleged embezzlement in reconstruction projects after the 2016 earthquake.
Mr. Noboa, during his presidential bid in 2023, stood as a credible outsider presenting the vision of a safer Ecuador, one leading a revolt against narco-terrorism and avowing to undo the “old paradigms” plaguing the country. “We will not negotiate with terrorists and we will not rest until we have returned peace to Ecuadorians,” Mr. Noboa said in January.
But the 36-year-old’s hard-line policies haven’t emerged as permanent solutions.
Murder rates dipped initially but boomeranged soon after. The coastal city of Guayaquil was overrun by gangs as recently as January; there was a surge of violence over the Easter weekend with more than 100 deaths. The President appears to be failing on the litmus test of crime rates, corruption and narco-terrorism policies, jeopardising his popularity and approval ratings.
The Embassy raids also hint at growing fraught relations with Mexico. A conict has emerged between the 70-year-old Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador and Mr. Noboa.
On April 3, Mr. Obradar questioned the result of the 2023 elections in which Mr. Noboa won; Mr. Noboa responded by declaring Mr. Obrador persona non grata and expelled the Mexican ambassador. Mexico, two days later, announced political asylum to Mr. Glas. Mr. Orabadar called the subsequent raids an “authoritarian action,” taken only when “weak governments that do not have popular support or capacity” come to power.
‘Inviolable spaces’
According to the 1961 Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations, embassies are protected, “inviolable” spaces — not technically “foreign soil,” but territories that enjoy immunity when carrying out the sovereign functions in the country where they are located. “The agents of the receiving state may not enter them, except with the consent of the head of the mission,” the Convention states.
Last year, Ecuador’s transport minister Maria de los Angeles Duarte, sentenced to eight years imprisonment for a bribery charge, escaped to Venezuela after living in the Argentine Embassy in Quito, leading to a diplomatic row between Ecuador and Argentina.
Mr. Noboa has also set himself against the diplomatic order for now. All Latin American countries, with the exception of El Salvador, have condemned Ecuador’s raids. European Union condemned it as a violation of the Vienna Convention.
Ecuador’s ally U.S. has not entirely condemned the raid but ambiguously reiterated the “obligation of host countries under international law to respect the inviolability of diplomatic missions.” Mexico, for now, has broken diplomatic relations with Ecuador and approached the United Nations.
The diplomatic rupture has put regional security under the radar. The raids “could set a very dangerous precedent, and that’s very concerning for the stability of diplomatic relations in the region,” wrote scholars Fabio Andrés Díaz Pabón and Maria Gabriela Palacio in a Conversation article.
Without any reconciliation, the spat could prove counterproductive to Ecuador’s narcoterrorism pursuits, and further jeopardise migrant safety. Ecuador is a point of transit for migrants attempting to reach Mexico and cross into North America; the provocation poses “serious risks in a region where illicit economies, violence and forced migration are spiralling out of control,” the scholars noted.