Spanish
The Ecuadorian Minister of the Interior, John Reimberg, reported this Thursday the arrest of an active-duty marine as part of an investigation related to drug trafficking, which lasted nine months.
He pointed out that in the operation twelve raids were carried out, in which there were nine detainees in total, in the coastal province of Guayas and the Andean province of Azuay.
Reimberg detailed that among those captured is Alberto Magno A., alias 'Albertito', a marine in active service and operational leader of the criminal group Los Choneros, who allegedly played a central role in illicit operations related to the contamination of containers with drugs, destined for the Netherlands, Belgium, France and the United Kingdom.
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"Another criminal economy falls. $100 million in drug shipments avoided," the official added on his X social media account.
Surrounded by Colombia and Peru, the two largest global producers of cocaine, with several ports on its coasts and a dollarized economy, Ecuador has become in recent years an important passage for the trafficking of that drug, which is mostly directed to Europe and North America.
Since 2024, Ecuador has been under an 'internal armed conflict' that the president, Daniel Noboa, declared to confront organized crime gangs, mainly dedicated to crimes such as drug trafficking, whom he began to call "terrorists".
Criminal organizations are behind the escalation of violence that led Ecuador to become in 2023 the Latin American country with the highest homicide rate, while 2025 began as the most violent year on record, with an average of approximately one murder per hour.
With 4,619 murders between January and June of this year, Ecuador recorded the most violent semester since records have been kept, according to data from the Ministry of the Interior, a trend that could lead the country to end the year with more than 50 homicides per 100,000 inhabitants.
