Ecuador in Trouble

**American Patriot** · September 30th, 2010, 18:28

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7...962257,00.html

Hundreds of soldiers and police protesting a new law that cuts their benefits have seized the main airport in Ecuador's capital and shut off highway access to it.

The rebellious troops fired tear gas and burned tires after taking over bases in Quito, Guayaquil and other cities. The protests do not appear to threaten to topple the government. (AP)

http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/N30267267.htm
ECUADOR CENTRAL BANK CHIEF ASKS PEOPLE NOT TO WITHDRAW MONEY FROM BANKS, APPEALS FOR CALM

http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/N30162840.htm
Source: Reuters
QUITO, Sept 30 (Reuters) - Looting broke out in Ecuador's capital Quito and second city Guayaquil on Thursday, witnesses said, as political unrest shook the South American country.

http://edition.cnn.com/2010/WORLD/am...ador.violence/
(CNN) -- Ecuador teetered on the verge of a government collapse Thursday, as national police took to the streets of Quito, the capital, and attacked the president over what they say was the cancellation of bonuses and promotions.

"This is a coup attempt," President Rafael Correa said in a TV interview a couple of hours after police lobbed tear gas at him.

A broadcast by the government's Ecuador TV showed mobs on the streets and clouds of black smoke coming from burning tires and garbage. Sporadic looting was reported.

Correa, who had taken to the streets to try to calm the situation, was surrounded and jostled by a crowd and forced to flee after the tear gas incident.

News photographs show a hunched-over Correa being led away as he covered his face with a gas mask. Correa, who recently underwent knee surgery, leaned on a crutch with his left arm. Another photo showed him lying on a stretcher.

He went on the air from a hospital a couple of hours later to denounce what he called a cowardly attack.

"They fired gas on us -- on the president of the republic," Correa said on the Ecuador TV telephone interview. "This is treason to the country, treason to their president."

He said rebel police officers were trying to enter his hospital room. He was prepared to die, Correa said.

Analysts pointed to the government's precariousness.

"This is the most serious protest that the government of Rafael Correa has faced," analyst Eduardo Gamarra told CNN en Español.

Rank-and-file police took over their headquarters, Ecuador TV said.

There also were reports that the military had taken control of their bases and the airport.

Government officials tried to quell the rebellion, insisting that the security forces had been misinformed and warning that the nation's democracy was in danger.

"I want to tell the country there has been an attempt at a coup," said Gabriel Rivera of the Country Accord Party.

"This is a Machiavellian plan organized by sectors of the right," Rivera said on Ecuador TV.

Miguel Carvajal, the minister for interior security, said there was no threat to salaries or benefits. He blamed the reports of the benefit cuts on a massive disinformation campaign.

"He who says that is lying," Carvajal said.

"We call on the citizens. We call on the armed forces. We call on other governments to defend our democratic institutions," he said.

A police spokesman went on the air on CNN affiliate Teleamazonas to dispute the government's allegations, saying that the security forces were in fact supporting Correa.

"Fellow officers who hear me nationally, stop this action," said the spokesman, identified only as Sgt. Mejia. "Don't close the streets. Return to the streets to work."

The disturbances occurred as Correa threatened to dissolve the national assembly over a dispute about several laws, including public service and education.

Angry police said they were overworked and underpaid.

"We work 14 hours a day," a uniformed officer said on Ecuador TV. "We are the ones who never protest."

Said another: "One hour without police. Let's see what happens."

Diego Borja, director of the central bank, went on the air to urge calm and for people to take care.

"The police are not protecting the people. They are protesting," he said. "There could be problems."

He also sought to prevent a run on deposits.

"The money is safe," he said. "But be careful if making large withdrawals."

**Luke** · September 30th, 2010, 19:37

This is not good news. I am hoping that we are not watching the future of our country.

**American Patriot** · September 30th, 2010, 19:40

Well, I haven't visited there so I can not from firsthand experience give any information about the place. But, it is not good if it is falling apart.

Ireland is fighting.

Spain I think it was a few days ago...

Greece in the last few months.

Paris is worried about terrorists.

Everyone is "going on strike" - but you know they brought it on themselves.

**Malsua** · September 30th, 2010, 19:55

Where is this mythical Ecudor?

Any relation to the south American country of Ecuador?

**American Patriot** · September 30th, 2010, 20:07

Same place, different seplling

hehe

**American Patriot** · October 1st, 2010, 13:21

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/02/wo...02ecuador.html

Standoff in Ecuador Ends With Rescue of the President

Dolores Ochoa/Associated Press
President Rafael Correa of Ecuador, sitting in a wheelchair, was rescued from a hospital, where he was held by rebellious elements of the police forces in Quito. More Photos »

By SIMON ROMERO

Published: October 1, 2010

CARACAS, Venezuela — The police chief in Ecuador resigned on Friday after an uprising by officers who held President Rafael Correa captive for more than 10 hours on Thursday, and the government maintained the state of emergency it had declared Thursday, several news agencies reported.

Multimedia

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Police Officers Strike in Ecuador

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Guillermo Granja/Reuters

President Rafael Correa of Ecuador spoke from the balcony of the Carondolet Palace as supporters gathered to greet him in Quito on Thursday night. More Photos »

The chief, Freddy Martínez, submitted his resignation on Friday morning, a spokesman for the police told Reuters, hours after President Correa vowed to overall the force on Thursday night in Quito, the capital.

Ecuadorean soldiers on Thursday stormed the police hospital where Mr. Correa was held by rebellious elements of the police forces and rescued him amid an exchange of gunfire in an effort to end a tense standoff between Mr. Correa and hundreds of protesting police officers and military personnel.

Speaking shortly after the rescue operation, which involved about 500 soldiers who entered the hospital grounds wearing gas masks, Mr. Correa delivered a fiery speech from the balcony of the presidential palace and blamed “infiltrated elements” of the security forces for the day’s events.

It was unclear if anyone died during the rescue, although Mr. Correa said that at least five people had been wounded.

The operation came during a state of emergency declared Thursday in Ecuador after Mr. Correa was caught at one point earlier in the day in an angry scrum of officers at a barracks in the Quito and was physically assaulted. He was tear-gassed, shoved, insulted and pelted with water, and emerged gasping for air.

He sought refuge in the police hospital, which was surrounded by protesting officers. Speaking to the news media by telephone, the president said that he was “practically captive,” while hundreds of his supporters marched on the police compound, demanding his release.

He called the protests “an attempt at a coup d’état” and lashed out at the protesting officers as “a bunch of ungrateful bandits.”

Striking police officers also occupied the National Assembly, where hundreds of Mr. Correa’s supporters gathered outside.

However, it was not clear on Thursday night whether the police officers, who were protesting a new law that would reduce their benefits and slow salary increases, also sought control of the government.

The standoff arose after security forces took over barracks in several cities to protest the law, part of a broader project to rein in government spending. Some members of the air force joined the protests in Quito, blocking the airstrip at the international airport and preventing planes from landing or taking off.

Miguel Carvajal, the minister in charge of internal security issues, said at least one person had been killed and several injured.

In the security vacuum created by protesting officers, sporadic robberies were reported at supermarkets and at banks, in the capital and in Guayaquil, a large coastal commercial city. Retail businesses and schools shut down.

Mr. Correa had gone to the barracks to address the police complaints in person. A shouting match ensued, and at one point, he loosened his tie and opened his shirt as if to show that he was not wearing a bulletproof vest. “If you want to kill the president, here he is,” he said. “Kill him, if you want to. Kill him if you are brave enough.”

The military leadership appeared to support the president. Gen. Ernesto González, the highest-ranking military official, called on the protesting police officers and troops to stand down. “We are a state of law,” he said in comments broadcast on Ecuadorean radio. “We are subordinated to the maximum authority, which is the president of the republic.”

Leaders from across the hemisphere expressed support for Mr. Correa, 47. The White House expressed support for Mr. Correa and urged a peaceful end to the crisis. “The United States deplores violence and lawlessness and we express our full support for President Rafael Correa, and for the institutions of democratic government in that country,” Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said in a statement.

The chaos raised new doubts over the stability of a country that had churned through eight different presidencies in the decade before Mr. Correa was first elected in 2006. Since then, Ecuador has enjoyed relative calm, and Mr. Correa’s leftist agenda of increased state control of the oil industry and welfare programs for the poor proved popular enough that he was re-elected in 2009.

But his approval ratings recently slipped amid protests over his efforts to reorganize the federal bureaucracy.

Maggy Ayala Samaniego contributed reporting from Quito, Ecuador, and María Eugenia Díaz from Caracas.

**American Patriot** · October 1st, 2010, 13:25

AMERICAS NEWS
OCTOBER 1, 2010, 8:55 A.M. ET

Ecuador Calls State of Emergency

By MERCEDES ALVARO And ROBERT KOZAK

QUITO—Ecuador declared a state of emergency on Thursday as protests by police and some members of the military led to nationwide unrest, accusations of a coup d'etat, and the dramatic rescue by army troops of the country's president, who was holed up in a hospital after being tear-gassed by police.
Police Strike in Ecuador

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Dolores Ochoa/Associated Press A police officer demonstrated next to a bonfire in Quito.

The troubles seemed to tilt dangerously when police protesting cuts to their benefits surrounded a hospital where President Rafael Correa was being treated after inhaling tear gas during an earlier visit to a police barracks. Mr. Correa's office said the police would not allow him to leave the hospital and were holding him hostage.

The showdown came to a dramatic climax as night fell, with soldiers clashing with police and storming the hospital. Minutes later, amid a barrage of gunfire broadcast live on Ecuadorean television, the army emerged with Mr. Correa safe and sound.

On Friday morning, the local press reported that the chief of Ecuador's national police had resigned. Mr. Correa vowed to push ahead with further purges in the police force saying that there would be "neither pardons nor forgetting" for what he deemed a failed attempt to oust him Thursday. Ecuador's attorney general said he had begun an investigation into the incident.

Reports said there had been at least one death, that of a police officer participating in the rescue. There several dozen were wounded in the fiefight, including a cameraman for Ecuadorian television.

Mr. Correa, a leftist and close ally of Venezuela's president Hugo Chavez, had said earlier in the day that the unrest was an attempted coup d'etat, and blamed former president Lucio Gutierrez of being responsible for the troubles. Last year, Mr. Correa handily won a second term against his Mr. Gutierrez, a retired army colonel who was president from 2003 to 2005. But Mr. Gutierrez claimed that he was victim of a "monstrous fraud" and has since remained a vocal opponent of Mr. Correa's government.

The trouble began early Thursday when some members of the military and national police walked off the job, protesting wage cuts proposed by the government. Members of Ecuador's air force stormed the international airport in Quito and blocked the runway.

Ecuadorean President Correa is attacked by protesters as unrest grips the nation. Video courtesy of Reuters.

Ecuador President Rafael Correa stands defiant in the face of an attempted coup, following unrest brought on by unpopular austerity measures. Video courtesy of Reuters.

Protests quickly spread to other cities, leading to roadblocks and rioting. Banks were closed after several were robbed. In the country's two other principal cities, Guayaquil and Cuenca, police took over government buildings, burned tires and set off tear gas, according to local media reports.

After Mr. Correa was freed by the military, he lashed out at the police who staged the protests.

"These police – and not all of them, because we saw what was happening – rose up not to fight against a tyrannical government, not against an invasion by a foreign enemy, but to protect their benefits," Mr. Correa said after being freed, addressing supporters who had gathered in Quito's central square to celebrate his release.

His supporters also lashed out against Mr. Gutierrez, chanting "Lucio, murderer." Mr. Correa, hearing the chants, nodded, and said "that's right."

Mr. Gutierrez denied the accusations and said Mr. Correa was partly behind a coup attempt against Mr. Gutierrez's government years ago.

The unrest stemmed from a series of legal changes that came into effect Wednesday night after the opposition in the Ecuadorean Congress failed to pass changes that would have modified a law sent by President Correa to the legislature. Failure to pass the modifications meant that the law, which slows salary increases for police and the military, went into effect. Mr. Correa has been a principal backer of the overhaul, saying salaries have ballooned in recent years.

Earlier in the day, Mr. Correa's government declared a state of emergency for five days, mobilizing the armed forces that weren't on strike. Mr. Correa called the protests an attempted coup, which caused expressions of concern from several Latin American nations, as well as the U.S.

The country's top military leaders, however, didn't appear to be backing the protests: The chairman of Ecuador's joint chiefs of staff said the armed forces backed Mr. Correa. That became clear when troops freed the president later in the day.

Critics of Mr. Correa said he had exaggerated earlier in the day by calling this a coup attempt. Rubén Darío Buitrón, an editor with El Comercio, a leading Quito newspaper, said that no coup was under way and that the government was spinning the protests in order to gain support.

"It is a media show and things have been exaggerated by the government in order to make it look like a victim," he said, adding that the problems originated from low-ranking officers, not from any group of military generals wishing to take control.

The unrest is significant in a nation plagued by political instability, where no president has finished a full term since 1996. A number of presidents since then have been pushed out following unrest in the streets.

Analysts said Mr. Correa could use the crisis to further consolidate power. On Thursday, Mr. Correa said he was seriously considering dissolving Congress. Under Ecuador's constitution, however, that would mean he would have to call new elections for both the parliament and for his job as president.

"President Correa's uncompromising style, and today's press statements, suggest the president will not easily back down from what is turning into the most serious political crisis of his mandate," said Goldman Sachs economist Alberto Ramos in a research note.

So far Mr. Correa, a U.S.-trained economist, has avoided the pitfalls of his predecessors. The president, who has pushed through a new constitution and boosted the government's stake in the local oil industry, appeals to many poor in Ecuador. But Mr. Correa is also facing strained public-sector finances, in part because of a shutoff of much international funding since his government defaulted on a series of sovereign bonds. He has been pushing through legislation by decree recently instead of relying on congressional approval, which has met with disapproval from various sectors of the cutbacks being implemented.

Write to Mercedes Alvaro at mercedes.alvaro@dowjones.com

**American Patriot** · October 1st, 2010, 13:26

Australians caught up in Ecuador rebellion

By Brigid Andersen
Updated 1 hour 30 minutes ago
PreviousNextSlideshow: Photo 1 of 2

Ecuador's president escaped the hospital after police and the military traded gunfire in the streets outside. (ABC)

Two Australians are sheltering in Ecuador's main hospital after a police rebellion which saw the country's president held hostage for 12 hours.

James Cook University medical students Zoe MacDonald and Nathan Milani were working at the Metropolitan hospital in Quito when gunfire rang out on the streets outside.

Rebel police were holding Ecuador president Rafael Correa captive in a police hospital situated opposite the Metropolitan hospital.

The president was trapped there for several hours before escaping in a wheelchair after a shoot-out between police and the military.

Mr Correa was treated after inhaling tear gas fired by police who were protesting at austerity measures. He then had to be rescued after the hospital was surrounded by rebel police.

Ms MacDonald and Mr Milani have been taking cover inside a room at the nearby hospital since the gunfire broke out.

Ms MacDonald's mother Julie Woodlock has told ABC News Online that her daughter is shaken but safe.

"I know Zoe was in the hospital that's opposite the hospital where the president was kept captive," she said.

"The first thing I heard about it was this morning. At that point in time, Zoe's heard that [the president] has had some tear gas and that there was a coup.

"But she was safe at the hospital and they were just waiting to see what was going on."

More than 50 people have been injured in the rebellion and there are reports at least one has been killed.

Ms Woodlock says the doctors are not allowed to leave the hospital and many are on duty in the emergency ward.

"Zoe's actually in a room at the moment in the hospital, which has cable so she has full access to phones and internet," she said.

Ms Woodlock says her daughter is now resting, with things having calmed down after the president's rescue.

"Several hours after that things had changed and the president had been moved on," she said.

"The firing had stopped - there'd been a lot of gunfire.

"The last message I got was that it was all quiet now and she was about to go to bed and have rest."
'Cowardly' attack

The president has since made it back to the presidential palace.

The rescue capped a dramatic day of violence and confusion that began when police angered over a law that would cut their bonus pay rose up in rebellion and seized barracks in Quito, Guayaquil and Cuenca.

Mr Correa went to the police barracks to face down the mutineers, telling them he would not back down.

They jostled him and threw a tear-gas canister that exploded close to his face. Then, outside the hospital, the police fired tear gas at his supporters before troops moved in.

The protests are the largest and most violent the country has seen in years.

"They fired tear gas at the president of the republic in the most cowardly way. It was a canister that exploded a few centimetres from my face that stunned me and my escort for several seconds, possibly minutes," Mr Correa.

"I had to put on a gas mask and some cowards took it off me so I would asphyxiate with the tear gas.

"The doctor ordered me to enter the embassy because of the problems with my leg, but in the tumult I twisted my ankle and so they brought me [here] because I practically couldn't breathe and because of my shoulder. I had to enter the police hospital.

"I mean they shot at the president. It's incredible. Our security forces, our national police."

The government has now declared a state of siege and has put the military in charge of public order.