Mexico breaks diplomatic ties with Ecuador
Ecuadorian police on Friday night arrested a politician who had taken refuge in the Mexican Embassy in Quito, Ecuador, after what Mexico described as a forced entry that violated the country’s sovereignty. The incident prompted Mexico to suspend diplomatic relations with Ecuador and inflamed already high tensions between the two countries.
The politician, Jorge Glas, a former vice president of Ecuador, had been sentenced to prison for corruption, Ecuador’s presidential office said in a statement, which added that there had been a warrant out for his arrest. Glas, who had been living at the embassy in Ecuador’s capital since December, was granted political asylum by Mexico earlier Friday.
The office of Ecuador’s president, Daniel Noboa, added that the arrest had gone forward because Mexico had abused the immunities and privileges granted to the diplomatic mission, and that Glas’ asylum was given “contrary to the conventional legal framework.”
Although it was difficult to immediately confirm exactly how the arrest happened, footage shared by Ecuadorian news media showed what appeared to be the aftermath, with police officers holding back onlookers as two black cars, sirens blaring, drove out of the embassy. A man identified by local reporters as Roberto Canseco, the Mexican official in charge at the embassy, could be seen shouting, “No!” before officers pushed him to the ground.
Canseco told reporters that he was about the leave the embassy when, suddenly, he was faced with “police, thieves, who entered the embassy overnight.” He said he physically tried to stop them from entering. “They hit me, I was hit on the ground,” he said. “Like criminals, they broke into the Mexican Embassy in Ecuador.”
The arrest follows months of dispute between the two nations, in part over Glas, whom Ecuadorian authorities considered a fugitive. Both sides have been trading barbs, with tensions escalating this past week after the Mexican president appeared to question the legitimacy of Ecuador’s most recent presidential election. The Ecuadorian government then effectively ordered Mexico’s ambassador to leave, declaring her a “persona non grata.” Mexico condemned that declaration on Friday, and also granted Glas asylum.
Mexico’s secretary of foreign affairs, Alicia Bárcena Ibarra, announced the breaking of diplomatic relations with Ecuador in a statement, saying that Mexican diplomatic personnel had suffered injuries in the episode at the embassy. She ordered Mexican diplomats to leave Ecuador and said Mexico would file an appeal to the International Court of Justice.
Shortly after the arrest, Mexico’s president, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, issued a statement calling the episode a “flagrant violation of international law and the sovereignty of Mexico” and saying that the Ecuadorian police had used force to enter the embassy.
Attacks on embassies carry particular weight because they are often viewed as a sanctuary for the citizens of their nations. They normally cannot be entered by the host country’s police without the permission of diplomatic staff.