How drug trafficking triggered Ecuador's crime wave

In a controversial decision on April 1, Ecuador’s President Guillermo Lasso issued a decree authorizing civilians to carry and use personal firearms.

The move comes amid a rising crime wave that just over the past month has seen police defuse a bomb strapped to a security guard after his employer refused to pay protection money; letter bombs mailed to at least five news stations targeting journalists; a human head found on a park bench with a note warning against theft and extortion, and the body of a decapitated man was found in a different town with a similar letter, as well as high-profile murders and seizures of drug shipments. 

Experts believe drug cartels have set root in Ecuador to benefit from its location nestled between two of the world’s main cocaine producers (Peru and Colombia) and proximity to major consumption centers (the US and Brazil), and in the process have driven an uptick in violent crimes.

To find out more, BNamericas interviewed Ecuador's former intelligence director Mario Pazmiño, currently a security and strategy consultant and professor at Quito-based Uniandes university.

BNamericas: Why is there so much violence and crime in Ecuador?

Pazmiño: The country underwent a mutation from a transit country to an international drug distribution center. After Brazil, it's currently the main exporter of cocaine from Latin America to Africa, Asia, Europe and the Middle East. It’s a major transformation that has caused crime levels to skyrocket.

BNamericas: What drove this transformation?

Pazmiño: Two factors. The first is the so-called balloon effect, which is the change in strategy of organized crime. Under attack in Colombia by the [former] administration of Alvaro Uribe, they sought a way to continue with the business by transferring part of its infrastructure to other countries, including Ecuador and Venezuela.

Secondly, there are 750 tonnes of [Colombian] cocaine that end up in Ecuador. There is a strip of land on the Pacific that includes the department of Nariño in Colombia and the province of Esmeraldas in Ecuador, from where 75% of all Colombian cocaine is shipped.

That 750t/year pass into Ecuadoran territory and then leave for Europe through different ports and airports.

BNamericas: When did that start to happen?

Pazmiño: The balloon effect occurred in 2004, and in 2010 the country became an important distribution center. In 2017-18, we were considered by the United States as a processing country, without being a producer. And as of 2022, we are the main international distribution platform in the Pacific basin.

BNamericas: Have Mexican drug cartels also entered Ecuador?

Pazmiño: The strip located between Nariño and Esmeraldas attracts the attention of different cartels and mafias. Each cartel comes to get drugs to take to the rest of the world, but they don’t come directly – they outsource through local gangs, which are in charge of exercising control in the territories they call sanctuaries. Some 38 sanctuaries have appeared along the Ecuadoran coast.

Additionally, this type of activity generates criminal governance, which is the displacement of the State and the consolidation of criminal organizations in those territories.

BNamericas: There’s a lot of talk about the Albanian mafia in Ecuador. Have they permeated political circles?

Pazmiño: There’s not only that one; there are also the Chinese and Russian ones, among others, operating for some time in Ecuadoran territory.

Organized crime tries to penetrate the government, and they have done that – that’s what the country is experiencing.

The Albanian mafia has been in Ecuador since before 2010 and has been permeating government structures, as have most of organized crime groups.

BNamericas: The situation is worsening. What solutions does Ecuador have?

Pazmiño: The problem is that there’s a lack of political decision by the State to face the problem directly.

You need broader patrolling along the northern border, in a bilateral agreement with Colombia, to avoid this inflow of cocaine, which is what generates the whole problem. There must also be a temporary militarization of ports and airports to block the flow of drugs abroad.

Investment is going to be affected by the levels of crime in the country, as are tourism and exports – and that’s going to generate more problems.

BNamericas: Is the proliferation of illegal mining in Ecuador also due to the penetration of drug trafficking?

Pazmiño: In this country, illegal mining has been going on for many years and organized crime groups are involved.