Police in Ecuador say they’ve freed 49 individuals who had been kidnapped by a felony gang within the southern of the nation.
Two of the suspected kidnappers had been arrested through the joint raid by the Ecuadorean safety forces in a mining space in Azuay province.
The highly effective Los Lobos (The Wolves) gang was behind the kidnapping, police mentioned.
Ecuador has seen a surge in gang violence lately as transnational felony organisations have expanded in to the Andean nation to make the most of its massive ports to export medication.
Video released by police exhibits closely armed officers coming into what seems to be the tunnel of a mine.
Little data has to this point been launched about these freed.
An earlier publish on social media by the Ecuadorean armed forces said that there have been three girls among the many kidnap victims.
Dynamite, weapons and ammunition had been seized through the raid, safety forces additionally mentioned.
Los Lobos is among the strongest gangs in Ecuador with an estimated 8,000 members.
Initially a jail gang accused of instigating a few of Ecuador’s bloodiest jail riots, Los Lobos has expanded its operations and now wields appreciable energy exterior the jail system.
Its members are concerned in contract killings, kidnappings for ransom and extortion.
The gang has additionally cast hyperlinks with the Mexican Jalisco New Technology cartel (CJNG), for which it smuggles cocaine from Colombia by means of Ecuador’s port cities to the US and Europe.
Fuelled by drug cash and armed by their Mexican allies, Los Lobos have turn into a formidable enemy for the Ecuadorean state.
In January, following a very bloody wave of killings and assaults, President Daniel Noboa deployed the military to try to quell the violence.
Guayaquil, Ecuador’s largest metropolis and its most vital port, has to this point been the worst hit by gang-related violence however the raid in Azuay means that mining areas are actually seen as profitable targets by Los Lobos.
