A local politician was killed in Ecuador on Monday, less than a week after a presidential candidate was shot at a campaign rally, party officials said.
Pedro Briones, a member of ex-president Rafael Correa’s Civic Revolution Party and one of the leaders of that political movement in Esmeraldas province on the Colombian border, was killed six days before the presidential election, presidential candidate Luisa Gonzalez said.
“My solidarity with the family of Comrade Pedro Briones, a young victim of violence,” Gonzalez said on social media platform X, formerly known as Twitter.
“Ecuador is going through its bloodiest period,” Gonzalez admitted. She called the current government unscrupulous and claimed the country was being taken over by organized crime gangs.
Ecuadorian media, citing a local police source, reported that Briones was shot outside his home in the city of San Mateo by two men on a motorcycle who then fled.
On August 9, the presidential election candidate Fernando Villavicencio was shot in the country’s capital, Quito. The 59-year-old centrist and active fighter against corruption was one of the eight candidates in the elections scheduled for August 20.
Following this assassination, Ecuadorian President Guillermo Lasso declared a state of emergency for two months. The president blamed organized crime for Villavicencio’s murder.
Six suspects, all Colombian nationals, were arrested in operations in southern Quito and a neighboring city. Another was shot by Villavicencio’s bodyguards shortly after the attack.
2023-08-15 11:46:34
#politician #killed #Ecuador #elections
