Armed assailants had on Friday, killed a criminal prosecutor in Ecuador, along with his police escort in the latest incident of violent crime to shake up the South American nation.
The attorney general’s office had announced the death of Marcelo Vasconez and his guard in a post on social media, adding that prosecutors and police were combing an area outside his office in the coastal city of Manta, located about 200 kilometers (124 miles) northwest of the country’s largest city, Guayaquil.
Additionally, a separate post confirming the deaths of the Vasconez and police escort have said that the national police have been deployed to bring those responsible to book.
The prosecutor served as part of the attorney general’s transnational organized crime unit, according to the local media and his apparent assassination has made it the ninth local prosecutor killed since 2019.
The targeted killings tallies with the growth of the country’s powerful organized crime groups, which President Daniel Noboa has sought to confront through ramped up enforcement, proposed crime-fighting measures as well as emergency edicts since last year.
