Ecuadorian President Daniel Noboa has announced a “strategic alliance” to fight organized crime with Erik Prince, the founder of the controversial private defense contractor formerly known as Blackwater.
Noboa, who launched a divisive military operation against criminal groups last year, posted a photo on X and Instagram showing him chatting with Prince at an office with an Ecuadorian flag in the background.
“We have established a strategic alliance to strengthen our capabilities in the fight against narcoterrorism and the protection of our waters from illegal fishing,” Noboa wrote on Tuesday. “There is no truce. There is no retreat. We are moving forward,” he added.
The president did not provide details on the partnership.
Noboa’s announcement has raised eyebrows in Ecuador. Former Army commander Luis Altamirano criticized the partnership, calling it “deplorable” that “they seek to hire the services of a mercenary army.”
“It’s truly deplorable that, under the guise of ‘international cooperation,’ they seek to hire the services of a mercenary army. In the end, the announced ‘special forces’ were a dubious private company. Is this announcement just another smokescreen?” the retired general said on X.
Prince, who is the brother of US President Donald Trump’s former Education Secretary Betsy DeVos, founded Blackwater, which gained notoriety in 2007 during the Iraq War, when its private contractors opened fire in Baghdad’s Nisour Square, killing 17 Iraqi civilians.
Four contractors were convicted and later pardoned by Trump.
Following the massacre, the company changed its name and Prince sold the firm in 2010. He currently identifies himself on his website as an investor, entrepreneur and leader in military affair reforms.
Prince was a prominent Trump supporter during the 2016 campaign. He spent time around senior transition officials and informally advised the Trump White House on some major foreign policy decisions early in Trump’s first term.
Ecuador’s crime crackdown
In his post announcing the partnership with Prince, Ecuador’s president wrote: “Organized crime has sown fear and believed it can operate with impunity. Their time is up. International aid begins in Ecuador.”
In early 2024, Noboa launched a nationwide crackdown to stop an outburst of gang violence. But the president, who is seeking reelection this year, has insisted that his country needs foreign support to solve the security crisis driven by local criminal groups linked to international drug cartels.
Ecuador has the highest homicide rate in Latin America, with 38.8 per 100,000 inhabitants, according to the most recent report from the organized crime research and analysis center InSight Crime. It is followed by Venezuela, Colombia, Honduras, and Brazil.
The Ecuadorian Ministry of the Interior says the start to the year has been the most violent in the country’s history, with more than 1,000 homicides.
The president said in a radio interview on Monday that Ecuador would receive international assistance and support in the coming days through “special forces abroad” that would arrive in the country to join the fight against organized crime.
Noboa did not specify where this new international support would come from, nor under what mechanisms foreign forces would operate in the country.