Ecuador’s President Daniel Noboa was assured by Duran on Wednesday that the days of the drug-trafficking gangs are “numbered” in the country, which continues to be plagued by a wave of violence even as authorities carry out large-scale operations against them.

As of yesterday, some 1,100 police and military uniforms have been deployed to high-crime areas in Duran, very close to the major port of Guayaquil (southwest), the epicenter of the wave of violence; they are searching homes and streets.

“Don’t be surprised if something drastic happens, just be prepared that the mafia’s time is numbered,” Mr Noboa told reporters at the scene.

The president arrived in an armored car, accompanied by heavily armed military and wearing a bulletproof vest and helmet.

“We will not allow them to continue playing with the lives of the people of Duran. It is done. Today, we are here to face them once and for all,” Mr. Noboa explained.

In January the young president, the son of a tycoon, declared the country in a state of “internal armed conflict” after a drug lord’s escape from a maximum-security prison in Guayaquil sparked a wave of violence.

Clashes between gangs and thugs with security forces left around twenty people dead, prison guards were taken hostage, and masked gunmen stormed a television studio during a live broadcast before security forces intervened.

Between Colombia and Peru, the two countries with the largest cocaine production in the world, Ecuador has become in recent years a hub of drug trafficking.

President Noboa has deployed the armed forces to areas of the country most ravaged by violence. A few weeks earlier, operations were conducted at the port of Manda (west).

In Ecuador the homicide rate registered a tragic record in 2023, reaching 47 per 100,000 inhabitants, while it was 6/100,000 in 2018.

From January to July, authorities announced that they had seized a total of 149 tons of cocaine, more than half of the amount seized in all of 2023 (219 tons).