Fernando Villavicencio, a presidential candidate for Ecuador’s top position, was assassinated during a rally on Wednesday. Organized crime is suspected of conducting the killing, due to the government’s mounting war on crime.
Villavicencio was a conservative former journalist and congressman, who actively investigated government corruption. In 2015, he sent documents to Wikileaks exposing Ecuador’s spying of Julian Assange while he was hosted by the embassy
The Wall Street Journal explained why Villavicencio was a target of cartels:
Villavicencio was a sharp critic of corruption and the drug gangs that have recently unleashed bloodshed across what had once been a relatively peaceful country. He recently said he had received threats from a local gang, known as the Choneros. The gang has ties to Mexico’s Sinaloa drug cartel, which security experts say ensures cocaine shipments from Colombia pass through Ecuador before heading north toward the U.S.
“This confirms that our campaign proposal would gravely affect these criminal structures,” he said referring to recent threats. “I’m not afraid.”
Other presidential candidates rushed to praise Villavicencio, who they praised as a fighter against corruption and narco-traffickers. International organizations and foreign countries reiterated the need for physical security of candidates to enable a democratic election. The current president, who is not running, also swore to punish the perpetrators of the act.
The BBC reported that:
A recent rise in violent crime, fuelled by the growing presence of drug cartels in Ecuador, has been a central issue in this year’s presidential campaign.
Last month, Mr Lasso declared states of emergency and night curfews in three provinces following a number of killings linked to organised crime.
Rising crime is a major problem across the Americas, especially in some Latin American countries. El Salvador took a drastic . While political and criminal violence has not escalated to that degree in the United States, laxity against criminals is a reason that Governor DeSantis sacked a district attorney for repeatedly refusing to prosecute major crime.
