Homicide ratio confirms Ecuador as the most violent country in the region

Ecuador closed the year 2023 with the tragic balance of 7,200 violent deaths, which represents a rate of 45 homicides per 100,000 population and places the country as the most violent of Latin America, according to data from the Ecuadorian Observatory of the Organized crime.

The increase in figures shows the new dynamics of violence and crime that the country is experiencing, indicates the most recent semi-annual bulletin of intentional homicides in Ecuador from the Observatory, referring to the period January-June 2023.

“In the first half of 2022, not only did the number of homicides double from the same period in 2021, but the first half of 2023 shows an increase of more than five times.” (528.1%) in the number of homicides compared to the first half of 2019″, according to this document.

The study also reveals that the average number of daily murders in the first half of 2023 was 19.72, which represents a growth in 69.1% of intentional homicides compared to the same period last year.

The increase in homicides has been constant in the period from 2016 (5.78 per 100,000 inhabitants) to 2023 (45), but the exponential increase began in 2019 (7.84) and continued in the following years: 2020 (13, 94), 2021 (19.66) and 2022 (25.32).

In fact, in 2022, homicides represented the fourth cause of death in the country, with a total of 4,451 deaths, a figure only surpassed by heart diseases (13,508), diabetes (5,051) and cerebrovascular diseases (4,970).

Ecuador’s criminal landscape, dominated by Colombian criminal groups as well as Mexican cartels, has turned the country into a growing hotspot for organized crime.

According to InSight Crime, an organization specialized in the analysis of issues related to organized crime and citizen security in the Americas, “the country’s gangs have become increasingly sophisticated and organized.”

“The gangs control many of the country’s prisons and have strengthened connections with major international criminal organizations by working as middlemen moving cocaine from neighboring countries through Ecuador’s huge ports to Europe, USA and even Australia”points out this NGO.

Proliferation of criminal groups

Ecuador’s criminal groups have traditionally been fragmented and operate as subcontractors for foreign criminal organizations, particularly Colombian and Mexican groups, indicates InSight Crime, which warns that in recent years “several prison and drug trafficking gangs that have grown enormously in sophistication and capture”.

Predominant among these gangs is that of Los Choneros, the largest and most sophisticated group, which began as an armed wing of an anonymous Colombian drug cartel that controlled the Pacific maritime trafficking routes to Mexico and the United States.

As time went by, Los Choneros became the most powerful prison gang in the country, with a presence in several prisons and cities where they carried out illegal activities such as micro-trafficking, hitmen, extortion and smuggling.

The Choneros, according to InSight Crime, have ties to Mexico’s Sinaloa Cartel, for which they transport cocaine. Their rival groups include Los Lagartos, Los Lobos, Los Tiguerones, Chone Killers and the Nueva Generación Ecuador Cartel.

To these organizations, which have carried out half a dozen bloody riots in Ecuadorian prisons between 2022 and 2023, we must add groups linked to Colombian guerrilla groups, such as the Oliver Sinisterra Front – a dissident faction of the FARC – and the Liberation Army National (ELN).

Albanian traffickers have also established a strong presence in the country. “Cocaine lords like Dritan Rexhepi have moved tons of drugs from Ecuador to Europe,” reveals InSight Crime.