As Ecuador battles gangs, lawmakers approve return of foreign military bases

QUITO, Ecuador (AFP) -- Ecuador's parliament on Tuesday gave the green light for the establishment of foreign military bases in the country as it seeks international assistance in its battle against violent drug gangs.
Foreign bases were outlawed in Ecuador in 2009, but President Daniel Noboa has vowed to bring them back as he pursues a crackdown on cartels blamed for turning what was once one of the region's most peaceful countries into one of its most violent.
Noboa has asked US President Donald Trump for military backing and in February said he would invite "special forces" from unnamed allied countries to help.
He has announced an alliance with US mercenary Erik Prince, founder of security contractor Blackwater, and said last month that Israel wants to help Ecuador with intelligence.
Noboa, 37, was sworn in for a second term in May after claiming a runaway reelection victory with promises to take an "iron fist" to gangsters.
Once-peaceful Ecuador averaged a killing every hour at the start of the year as cartels battled for control over cocaine routes that pass through the nation's ports.
There are an estimated 40,000 gang members in Ecuador, the president has said, and about 20 gangs with links to international cartels.
Noboa last year declared Ecuador to be in an internal armed conflict, empowering him to deploy the armed forces in the streets and prisons. But despite his tough-on-crime policies, Ecuador has the highest murder rate in Latin America.
The US had a military base in the South American country, at the fishing port of Manta, until 2009 when a constitutional prohibition entered into effect that Noboa wants overturned.
With 82 votes out of 151 members, Ecuador's unicameral National Assembly with its pro-government majority on Tuesday approved a constitutional reform to allow for such bases to be brought back.
"This is a decisive contribution to security ... and for the return of peace to Ecuadoran territory," the parliament stated on X. In a separate statement, it said the reform had "the aim of strengthening international cooperation in the fight against transnational organized crime."
The measure would allow for "the recovery of national security through strategic cooperation, intelligence sharing, and technology transfer, which will strengthen the operational capacities of the state," the congress added.
The Constitutional Court must now review the text of the reform, which will then be submitted to a referendum. Parliamentary backers of socialist ex-leader Rafael Correa -- on whose watch foreign bases were outlawed -- voted against the measure.

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