Reports from Ecuador indicate that inmates in six facilities have once again taken guards and police officers hostage. The situation has been confirmed by Ecuador’s National Prison Service and was reported by a news outlet.
As of 6 p.m. local time on Thursday (02:00 Friday, Moscow time), seven police officers and fifty prison guards were being held across the six institutions.
Authorities suggested that the hostage actions are likely a reaction by criminal groups to ongoing searches for contraband items inside the prisons, a pressure tactic tied to broader efforts to curb illicit materials inside these facilities.
This pattern echoes a similar incident at another Ecuadorian jail at the end of July, when inmates held guards hostage following a hunger strike, signaling persistent tensions around control and daily life behind bars.
Separately, in a different arena, a court in Moscow dealt with a separate set of charges involving two Lithuanian nationals and two Russian individuals connected to cocaine shipments reported to have originated in Ecuador and moved to Russia in quantities exceeding 472 kilograms.
In that case, the jury delivered an acquittal for Georgy Radomirov, Ivan Radomirov, Ernestas Kazlauskas, and Mindaugas Koretsas, effectively clearing them of the primary drug trafficking convictions they faced.
The fifth defendant, Igoris Grigas, was nevertheless found guilty on lesser charges related to ancillary incidents. Legal counsel noted that time already spent in pre-trial detention was treated as part of a completed sentence, resulting in an effective imprisonment period of around five and a half years for Grigas.
In another news thread, a flight traveling from Istanbul to Moscow faced an emergency landing prompted by disruptive behavior from a young passenger, described in reports as a violent incident that required immediate safety measures.