The Mayor’s Office raises two conditions: that the Government provides resources and that the deprivation center be regional.
The Municipality of Cuenca wants to manage the Center for the Deprivation of Liberty (CPL), located in the Turi parish. In the session of the Cantonal Committee for Emerging Operations (COE) held this Tuesday, this issue was raised, but under two conditions: that the national government give them resources for it and make it regional and not national as it is currently.
Throughout Ecuador, the management of prisons is in charge of the National Service of Comprehensive Attention to Adults Deprived of Liberty and Adolescent Offenders (SNAI), but this Tuesday the mayor of the city and president of the COE, Pedro Palacios, stated that they, as a Municipality, want to take charge of this space because they have seen that there are serious problems in its management.
Given that running a prison is not easy, Palacios raised two conditions to the national government: that it give them the respective resources and “as long as the Turi CPL is regional.” Likewise, he once again insisted that the transfers stop, in his words, “unjustified”, without a prior criminological analysis to determine their level of danger and link with criminal gangs.
In this regard, the zonal coordinator 6 of the Ministry of Government, José Jara, affirmed that Palacios’ request is not feasible because that is a national competence, specifically the SNAI. But that within the framework of the state of exception, it will manage that resources arrive to improve the technical and administrative conditions of this place, which houses about 2,600 people deprived of liberty from different provinces of Ecuador.
Regarding the transfers, he assured that this is an autonomous decision of the penitentiary judges who have total freedom of action and cannot be interfered with from the Executive power.
Regarding the declaration of the state of exception and its incidence in Azuay, the zonal commander of the Police, Rafael Pérez, commented that this will help them to improve coordination with other institutions while maintaining their powers. (I)
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