Mexico breaks diplomatic ties with Ecuador after police storm its embassy to arrest politician

MSN via AP ^ | 04/06/2024 | REGINA GARCIA CANO and GABRIELA MOLINA,

[SeekAndFind]

QUITO, Ecuador (AP) — Mexico's government severed diplomatic ties with Ecuador after police broke into the Mexican Embassy to arrest a former Ecuadorian vice president, an extraordinary use of force that shocked and mystified regional leaders and diplomats.

Ecuadorian police late Friday broke through the external doors of the embassy in the capital, Quito, to arrest Jorge Glas, who had been residing there since December. Glas sought political asylum at the embassy after being indicted on corruption charges.

The raid prompted Mexico's President Andrés Manuel López Obrador to announce the breaking off of diplomatic relations with Ecuador on Friday evening, while his government's foreign relations secretary said the move will be challenged at the World Court in The Hague.

“This is not possible. It cannot be. This is crazy,” Roberto Canseco, head of the Mexican consular section in Quito, told local press while standing outside the embassy right after the raid. “I am very worried because they could kill him. There is no basis to do this. This is totally outside the norm.”

On Saturday, Glas was taken from the attorney general’s office in Quito to the port city of Guayaquil, where he will remain in custody at a maximum-security prison. People who had gathered outside the prosecutor’s office yelled “strength” as he left with a convoy of police and military vehicles.

Glas' attorney, Sonia Vera, told The Associated Press that officers broke into his room and he resisted when they attempted to put his hands behind his back. She said the officers then “knocked him to the floor, kicked him in the head, in the spine, in the legs, the hands,” and when he “couldn’t walk, they dragged him out.”

[Vaduz]

Mexico breaks diplomatic ties with Ecuador after police storm its embassy to arrest politician.

Biden sending his people there to mend the problem he can’t have his trafficking plan halted.

[Grampa Dave]

The Iran hostage crisis was a diplomatic standoff between Iran and the United States.

Fifty-three American diplomats and citizens were held hostage after a group of militarized Iranian college students belonging to the Muslim Student Followers of the Imam’s Line, who supported the Iranian Revolution, including Hossein Dehghan (future Iranian Minister of Defense), Mohammad Ali Jafari (future Revolutionary Guards Commander-In-Chief) and Mohammad Bagheri (future Chief of the General Staff of the Iranian Army),

[3][4] took over the U.S. Embassy in Tehran[5][6] and took them as hostages. The hostages were held for 444 days, from November 4, 1979 to their release on January 20, 1981. The crisis is considered a pivotal episode in the history of Iran–United States relations.[7]