At least nine people were shot dead on Saturday while playing pool in a tourist city in southwestern Ecuador, the country’s prosecutor’s office said.
A group of armed men opened fire on several people at a bar in a working-class neighborhood of General Villamil Playas, a coastal city in the southern Guayas province and destination for local tourists.
The Ecuadorian prosecutor’s office wrote on social media that “armed individuals entered the establishment and shot at those present.”
Photo: Reuters
Viral images on social media showed at least nine bloodied bodies lying on the floor around several pool tables.
Local media reports said the attackers were armed with automatic rifles.
At the bar where the massacre occurred, relatives held two coffins on Saturday night. Bullet holes were visible on the pool tables, according to images captured by an AFP reporter.
Police Colonel Jhanon Varela told media that two people were injured in the attack and treated at a local hospital.
Authorities have only been able to identify one body at the scene.
“Unfortunately, when the police arrive, many of those affected by this event are removed from the scene by residents and family members,” Varela said. “It is presumed that there may be more victims.”
Guayas Prefect Marcela Aguinaga said one of the victims was a coach at a provincial football school.
“Violence... seeks to bring us to our knees, silence us, and accustom us to horror. But we will not stay silent. Nor will we surrender,” Aguinaga wrote on social media.
The shooting comes as Ecuador experiences its most violent start to a year in recent history, according to experts.
In the first five months of this year, Ecuador recorded 4,051 homicides, according to official figures.
Drug trafficking organizations have been multiplying in Ecuador, where the homicide rate rose from six per 100,000 residents in 2018 to 38 per 100,000 last year.
Following the recapture last month of the country’s biggest drug lord, Adolfo Macias, alias Fito, after his escape from a maximum-security prison last year, criminal gang violence continues unabated.
This week, in the western province of Manabi, the stronghold of Fito and his Los Choneros gang, at least 20 people were killed in deadly violence in several cities, including Manta, where Fito was recaptured.
Ecuadorian Minister of the Interior John Reimberg announced increased security in Manta, one of Ecuador’s main fishing ports, with 2,500 police officers “deployed at strategic points.”
After his arrest, Fito agreed to be extradited to the US where prosecutors accuse him of cocaine and arms trafficking.
Once considered a bastion of peace in Latin America, Ecuador has been plunged into crisis after years of expansion by transnational cartels that use its ports to ship drugs to the US and Europe.
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