“Not even in the worst dictatorships”: Rafael Correa spoke about the arrest of his former vice president and said that President Daniel Noboa confuses Ecuador “with one of his banana plantations”

Former president of Ecuador Raffaele Correa On Saturday he assured that the current president, Daniele Noboaconfuses the country “with one of its banana plantations”, after the Ecuadorian government decided to raid the Mexican embassy to arrest former vice president Jorge Glas, to whom the Mexican executive had granted political asylum.

In a message published on his personal account on the social network unusual of the entry of Ecuadorian authorities into the Mexican diplomatic headquarters in Quito to arrest Glas, stating this “is unprecedented in the history of Latin America”.

“Not even in the worst dictatorships has a country’s embassy been violated. We do not live in a state of law, but in a state of barbarism, with an improviser who confuses his homeland with one of his banana plantations” Correa said, referring to Noboa, whose family owns Ecuador’s largest banana emporium, the world’s top exporter of that fruit.

“We hold Daniel Noboa responsible for the safety and physical and psychological integrity of former vice president Jorge Glas. To Mexico, its people and its government, our apologies and our eternal admiration. Always until victory!”, he attacked the former president.

“We are not only faced with fascism: we are faced with barbarism. Immoral and ignorant government!”, he insisted in another message, in which he published a copy of the statement released by the Ecuadorian government in which he explained the official actions relating to the episode .

The Ecuadorian government defended its actions in a statement confirming Glas’ arrest and his making available to the judicial authorities.

The text, entitled “We defend national sovereignty, zero impunity”, indicates this “no criminal can consider himself politically persecuted” and added that “since the immunities and privileges of the diplomatic mission hosting Glas were abused and diplomatic asylum was granted contrary to the conventional framework, his capture proceeded.”

In the midst of the incursion of the troops, the head of the Mexican consular section in Quito Roberto Canseco led a tough fight in an attempt to prevent them from taking Glas. “It’s an outrage, it’s against the rules, it can’t be,” he shouted at members of the security forces as he rose from the ground. “They hit me on the ground, I physically tried to prevent them from entering. Like criminals they broke into the embassy. This is not possible, it cannot be. It is madness”, he denounced.

Gustavo PietroEven , president of Colombia, reacted on his social networks by defending Glas’ political asylum: “Colombia respects the universal right to political asylum. All my solidarity with Mexico’s diplomatic staff in Quito”.

“The Vienna Convention and Mexico’s sovereignty over Ecuador have been broken. I insist once again that Latin America and the Caribbean, whatever the social and political constructions of each country, keep alive the precepts of international law amidst the barbarism that is advancing in the world and the democratic pact on the continent”, he added in

Since 2017, Glas serves two sentences, one for a corruption case and another related to the Odebrecht case. He was released at the end of November 2022. Furthermore, an investigation is open against him for irregularities in the reconstruction work of the 2016 earthquake during his administration. He had sought refuge in the Mexican embassy in Quito in December 2023.

Breakdown of relations between Mexico and Ecuador

The president of Mexico, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, has announced the formal severing of diplomatic relations with Ecuador, considering the invasion of the Quito embassy a violation of national sovereignty and international law.

The arrest of former vice president Glas at the Mexican embassy occurred at a moment of maximum tension in relations between the two countries, after Quito had expelled the Mexican ambassador Raquel Serur, following AMLO’s statements on the murder of the candidate Fernando Villavicencio and its consequences on the Mexican embassy. the elections that allowed Noboa to become president.

At the end of February, the Ecuadorian government asked the Mexican ambassador for permission to enter and detain Glas, when the López Obrador administration had not yet granted him political asylum.

Glas, who served as vice president of Ecuador during part of Rafael Correa’s presidential term (2007-2017) and at the beginning of Lenín Moreno’s presidential term (2017-2021), had been in the Mexican embassy in Ecuador since late December 2023 .

He had arrived there after being accused of alleged embezzlement (misappropriation of public funds) in the “Reconstruction” case of the coastal province of Manabí, after the strong earthquake that occurred in 2016.

Glas spent almost five years in prison between 2017 and the end of 2022, serving two corruption convictions of eight and six years in prison respectively for the crimes of corruption and illicit association in the irregular financing of the Correísta party and in the framework of the international corruption case of the Brazilian construction company Odebrecht.

In the same corruption ruling, former president Correa, who has refugee status in Belgium, was also sentenced to eight years in prison and politically disqualified, from where he also denounces the political persecution against him and those close to him during his government.