Powerful Ecuador drug lord 'Fito' extradited to US
Known as "Fito", he was recaptured in June, almost a year after he escaped from a high-security prison where he was serving a 34-year sentence for a series of crimes.
He will appear in a US federal court on Monday, where he will plead not guilty to international charges of drug and weapons trafficking, his lawyer told Reuters.
Macías was leader of Los Choneros gang, which is linked to powerful criminal organisations from Mexico and the Balkans. He is also suspected of having ordered the assassination of presidential candidate Fernando Villavicencio in 2023.
Los Choneros is blamed for Ecuador's transformation from a tourist haven to a country with one of the highest murder rates in the region.
More than 70% of all cocaine produced in the world currently passes through Ecuador's ports. The country is located between the world's two top cocaine exporters, Colombia and Peru.In June, police tracked Macías down to what they described as an underground bunker below a luxury home in the city of Manta. He was taken to La Roca, a maximum security prison. At the time, Ecuador's President Daniel Noboa praised the security forces for capturing him and said that he would be extradited to the US.The country's prison authority said he was taken out of prison in Ecuador earlier on Sunday to be handed over to US authorities."Mr Macías and I will appear tomorrow before the Brooklyn federal court ... where he will plead not guilty," his lawyer, Alexei Schacht, told Reuters. "After, he will be held in a to-be-determined prison."Ecuadoreans voted in favor of allowing the extradition of citizens in a referendum called by President Noboa, who vowed to crack down on rising crime.In March this year, Noboa told the BBC he wants US, European and Brazilian armies to join his "war" against criminal gangs. — BBC
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Arab News
a minute ago
- Arab News
French PM slams EU-US trade deal as ‘submission'
PARIS: French Prime Minister Francois Bayrou on Monday slammed a weekend trade deal between the United States and the European Union as a 'dark day' and tantamount to 'submission,' as other politicians poured vitriol on the deal.'It is a dark day when an alliance of free peoples, united to affirm their values and defend their interests, resorts to submission,' said Bayrou in a post on X of the accord thrashed out President Donald Trump and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen struck the deal, which fixed a baseline tariff of 15 percent on EU exports to the President Emmanuel Macron did not immediately react Monday to the high-stakes agreement, which drew wider criticism across much of the French political spectrumStock markets rose in Europe and Asia on hopes the agreement can avert a potentially damaging trade many French politicians were not convinced.'Ursula von der Leyen accepted yesterday the commercial surrender of Europe, to the detriment of our exporters, farmers, and industrialists,' Jordan Bardella, president of the far-right National Rally, wrote on day before, Bardella's party colleague and three-time presidential candidate Marine Le Pen had criticized the deal as 'a political, economic and moral fiasco.''This is a defeat for the European Commission, which failed to create the power dynamics needed properly to defend European interests,' said Pieyre-Alexandre Anglade, a Macron ally in parliament and president of the National Assembly's European Affairs blasted what he said was a 'signal of weakness' sent 'to our competitors (and) we must fight to reverse the situation.'A Bayrou ally in his Democratic Movement, lawmaker Philippe Latombe, said on X he 'deeply regrets' a deal which 'while it certainly avoids a trade war, comes at the cost of culpable subservience, a mortgage on our future, and the sacrifice of entire sectors of our sovereignty. It's a bad deal, except for Trump.'On Sunday, the Socialist Party said the EU appeared cast as a US 'vassal' while far-left France Unbowed leader Jean-Luc Melenchon said France's choice was one of 'non-submission to the (US) Empire and non-alignment.'The French finance ministry told AFP Finance Minister Eric Lombard and Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot would Wednesday discuss 'consequences' of the deal with major French economic players.
Saudi Gazette
an hour ago
- Saudi Gazette
Five killed in Bangkok market mass shooting
BANGKOK — Five people were killed in a mass shooting at a food market in Bangkok on Monday. The suspect in the attack at Or Tor Kor Market died after taking his own life, police in Thailand's capital confirmed. Four of those who were killed were security guards and the fifth victim worked at the market. Two other market sellers were injured, police said. Police Lieutenant Siam Boonsom told local media that the gunman was Thai and he had disputes with the market's security guards before. He also told reporters the shooting incident was unrelated to Thailand's ongoing conflict with Cambodia. The Or Tor Kor market is well known for high quality fresh fruit and ownership rates in Thailand are relatively high for the region and mass shooting incidents are not common, but the country has seen several deadly incidents in recent 2023, a 14-year-old boy killed two people and injured five others in a shooting at a luxury shopping mall in the centre of ex-policeman killed at least 37 people, most of them children, in a gun and knife attack at a childcare centre in in Nong Bua Lamphu province in north-east Thailand in October 2020, a soldier killed 29 people and injured dozens more in the city of Nakhon Ratchasima. — BBC
Asharq Al-Awsat
an hour ago
- Asharq Al-Awsat
French PM Says EU-US Trade Deal an Act of ‘Submission' and a Dark Day for Europe
France called a framework trade deal between the United States and European Union a "dark day" for Europe, saying the bloc had caved in to US President Donald Trump with an unbalanced deal that slaps a headline 15% tariff on EU goods while sparing US imports from any immediate European retaliation. The criticism from Prime Minister Francois Bayrou followed months of French calls for EU negotiators to take a tougher stance against Trump by threatening reciprocal measures — a position that contrasted with the more conciliatory approaches of Germany and Italy. "It is a dark day when an alliance of free peoples, brought together to affirm their common values and to defend their common interests, resigns itself to submission," Bayrou wrote on X of what he called the "von der Leyen-Trump deal". The high-level French criticism, and President Emmanuel Macron's silence since the deal was signed between Trump and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, stood in contrast with the more benign reaction from Berlin and Rome. French government ministers acknowledged the agreement had some benefits, including exemptions for sectors such as spirits and aerospace, but said it remained fundamentally unbalanced. "This state of affairs is not satisfactory and cannot be sustained," French European Affairs Minister Benjamin Haddad said on X, urging the EU to activate its so-called anti-coercion instrument, which would allow for non-tariff retaliation. Trade Minister Laurent Saint-Martin criticized the EU's handling of the negotiations, saying the bloc should not have refrained from hitting back in what he described as a power struggle initiated by Trump. "Donald Trump only understands force," he told France Inter radio. "It would have been better to respond by showing our capacity to retaliate earlier. And the deal could have probably looked different," he added. Macron had said that the EU should respond in kind if the United States slapped tariffs on EU goods, and apply equivalent measures on US imports into the bloc, in particular on services, in which the US enjoys a surplus with the EU. But the softer line advocated by German Chancellor Friedrich Merz and Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, whose countries are more dependent than France on exports to the US, prevailed.
