There’s some serious shit going down in Ecuador. President Daniel Noboa announced the country is in an “internal armed conflict” with armed gangs running rampant, including one that briefly took over a television studio during a live broadcast in Guayaquil on Tuesday. The national police chief announced the arrest of thirteen people for that attack, according to the Associated Press, with the country’s attorney general saying they will face terrorism charges.
Guayaquil is also the location of a prison where a major gang leader was jailed pending his transfer to a federal prison, however, he disappeared on Sunday, and it’s unclear if his disappearance was an escape or a kidnapping. Around the country, seven members of the national police have been kidnapped by various gangs, with at least one posting a video, purportedly of three of the kidnapped officers, with one of them reading a prepared statement: “You declared war, you will get war. You declared a state of emergency. We declare police, civilians and soldiers to be the spoils of war.”