A new report from Human Rights Watch (HRW) alleges that a joint US-Ecuador military campaign aimed at combating organized crime has resulted in attacks and abuses against civilians in Ecuador.
The rights group on Tuesday called on the US Congress to assert greater oversight over the Trump administration's militaristic approach to crime in Latin America, particularly its “perilous” partnership with Ecuador, which purportedly involved Washington providing “equipment, training, intelligence, and most recently, direct military support.”
The report, based on 62 interviews and analysis of over 100 photographs and videos, satellite imagery, vessel monitoring data, and judicial documents, focused on joint attacks on land and sea. Between March 1 and 6, in a border settlement near Colombia, Ecuadorian soldiers allegedly “arbitrarily detained and tortured” four dairy farm workers and burned three properties, later dropping munitions on two of them. One detainee claimed soldiers “tortured me with electricity, with a taser.”
HRW investigators found no evidence that the targeted properties were camps for the Comandos de la Frontera group, as the Ecuadorian government claimed; two sites had been abandoned for years, and the third was an operating dairy farm. The extent of US involvement in these specific attacks remains unclear, though the Trump administration has acknowledged its forces were “present” in the region.
The report also found evidence of US involvement in attacks on Ecuadorian fishermen in the Eastern Pacific. Between January and March 2026, two fishing vessels were attacked near the Galapagos Islands, and the vessel Fiorella disappeared with its eight crew members. Survivors reported seeing a US-flagged patrol vessel before the disappearance. Crews of two other vessels said they were boarded by US nationals in military-style uniforms bearing US flag insignias and later transferred to the Salvadoran Coast Guard.
HRW stated that many questions remain unanswered despite multiple requests to Washington and Quito. “First and foremost, it is unclear what happened to the Fiorella and its crew,” the report said. The operations are part of a broader militaristic pivot by the Trump administration in Latin America, which has included designating several criminal groups as “foreign terrorist organizations” and framing the strategy as a “war” against “narco-terrorists.”
Source: www.aljazeera.com