Ecuadorean army comes under attack in border sweep
Spillover from the Colombian conflict into Ecuador is becoming increasingly manifest. The Ecuadorean military, spurred into heightened surveillance activity by the recent discovery of Farc guerrilla camps inside Ecuador, have discovered in Sucumbíos, in late July, four more suspect encampments and engaged an unidentified armed group in a brief gunbattle. Elsewhere in the provinces bordering on Colombia they have discovered and destroyed several coca plantations.
In early July army patrols combing the north-western border province of Esmeraldas as part of the border protection plan came upon a field planted with 3,000 coca bushes close to the border and several dispersed coca plantations covering 4 hectares in the Pampa de Oro sector. They also seized 40 kilos of cocaine in the La Tolita sector.
On 21 July the military launched a sweep codenamed Limpieza II ('Cleanup II'), deploying 1,200 soldiers in the sectors of Sofía and Santa Rosa de los Cofanes, in the northern border province of Sucumbíos.
While nothing was found in the Sofía sector, in that of Santa Rosa de los Cofanes the army found four camps described as possible bases of illegal Colombian armed groups. In one of them the soldiers seized grenades and drums of chemicals used in the processing of coca base.
On 27 July an army patrol came under fire, in the Ají river sector, from what the defence ministry described as a 'subversive group'. In the subsequent exchange of gunfire one of the attackers was killed. He was found to be wearing civilian clothes, and carried no identity documents.
In an unrelated army operation in the eastern province of Pastaza, the army seized 55 kilos of plastic explosive — apparently originating in the stocks of an oil company — in the provincial capital, Puyo. In connection with this five members of the autonomous Kichwa community of Sarayacu were arrested. This community has a long history of conflict with the oil companies operating in the province.