Three bodies have been found in an Ecuadorian prison

At that particular prison, the armed forces carried out a seizure and control of weapons and explosives in the morning, as noted by the National Comprehensive Care Service for Adults Deprived of Their Liberty and Adolescent Offenders (SNAI).

However, in the afternoon, when the agents conducted the review of the prisoners, they found three persons hanging, without vital signs, with supposed signs of hanging.

During the search, they found firearms, ammunition, cocaine, cell phones, money, and alcoholic beverages, among other items and contraband items.

Discovery of dead prisoners has become frequent in this Andean nation, where prison crisis is a latent problem that has claimed the lives of more than 400 inmates in massacres and other prison conflicts in the past two years.

The Permanent Committee for the Defense of Human Rights ruled out, in a recent report, that these apparent suicides were the real cause of the deaths, and attributed the deaths to fights and extortion inside detention centers.

From prisons, gangs such as Los Chone Killers, Los Choneros, Los Lobos and Los Tiguerones seek to control drug trafficking in the country, while law enforcement officers claim to have seized more than 150 tons of drugs so far this year.

Violence has also spread in the streets, as criminal gangs are also fighting for control of drug trafficking, especially in the coastal region, from whose ports drugs leave for the United States and Europe.

The crisis of prisons and security is becoming more apparent with robberies, murders, extortion, kidnappings, bomb threats and other crimes, while citizens demand comprehensive measures from the government of President Guillermo Lasso to confront them.

jha/avr