Gas flaring and oil drilling in the Amazon continued. Conditions in prisons remained extremely poor. There were reports of possible extrajudicial executions and enforced disappearances. Human rights defenders continued to face security risks and the government failed to protect them. Arbitrary arrests were prevalent. Mining went ahead without the consent of Indigenous Peoples. Access to abortion remained severely restricted. Impunity prevailed for human rights violations committed by security forces in 2019 and 2022.
Background
In January, President Daniel Noboa declared an “internal armed conflict” and state of emergency in response to actions by organized crime groups. Authorities maintained states of emergency throughout the year, deploying the military to patrol the streets. In April, voters in a national referendum approved further powers for the military in public security tasks.
In May, the UN Special Rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights reported on “a vicious cycle of poverty and insecurity”, predominantly affecting racialized sectors of the population who continued to experience discrimination based on intersecting markers of identity.
Right to a healthy environment
The government continued to allow gas flaring in the Amazon, despite a 2021 court ruling that flares, which can be harmful to the environment and people’s health, must be extinguished.1
At the end of the year, the authorities had failed to halt oil drilling in the Amazon’s Yasuni National Park, missing the deadline imposed by a 2023 referendum.
Executive Decree 754 remained in force, even though human rights organizations continued to express concern that it was not in line with international standards on the right to participation in environmental decision-making processes.
Detainees’ rights
Prisons remained chronically overcrowded and reports of torture and other ill-treatment increased after the military was given control of prisons in January. Access to food and medical services was inadequate. At least three prison directors were killed during the year.
The UN Committee against Torture called on Ecuador to address the prison crisis and its systemic causes, “prioritizing policies of rehabilitation, re-education and social reintegration, [and] the demilitarization of control of prisons.”
Extrajudicial executions
The Public Prosecutor’s Office noted a spike in reports of possible extrajudicial executions, with 27 reported in the first half of 2024, an increase on previous years.
Enforced disappearances
Human rights organizations and residents in coastal regions reported several arbitrary detentions by security forces during their operations, some of which could constitute enforced disappearances, according to the Public Prosecutor’s Office.
In December, the Public Prosecutor’s Office pressed charges against 16 members of the military for the alleged enforced disappearance of four children in Guayaquil, who were later found dead.
Human rights defenders
Human rights defenders continued to face hostility and security risks, particularly land, territory and environmental defenders. Incidents included threats, intimidation, online violence and killings.
Numerous human rights defenders from Las Naves, Bolívar province, faced criminal proceedings in relation to their work on the right to water in the context of mining operations. At least six of these defenders were sentenced to prison.
President Noboa repeatedly stigmatized human rights defenders working for the rights of detainees. The government failed to carry out meetings with civil society to ensure a participative approach in designing its security policy.
In November, at least two human rights defenders were arrested while observing protests against power shortages in the capital, Quito.
Arbitrary arrests and detentions
Security forces carried out thousands of possible arbitrary arrests, resorting to the pretext of on-the-spot arrests of people caught committing a crime, apparently with little justification. Civil society organizations and media sources suggested that these arrests were disproportionately directed at groups historically subject to discrimination, including Afro-descendants, Indigenous Peoples, people of lower socio-economic status and young people. Authorities failed to maintain fully transparent records of these arrests.
Indigenous Peoples’ rights
In March, in Cotopaxi province, more than 70 individuals, including Indigenous leaders and human rights defenders, faced criminal investigations following protests against mining activities and a consultation process they deemed illegitimate.
The UN Special Rapporteur on extreme poverty recommended strengthening the anti-discrimination framework by “guaranteeing legal security of tenure concerning Afro-descendants’ and Indigenous peoples’ traditional land, territories and natural resources and by ensuring free, prior and informed consultation and consent for establishing and managing protected areas.”
Right to truth, justice and reparation
Several UN experts highlighted the importance of the Constitutional Court hearing in April relating to grave human rights violations, including forced labour and servitude, suffered by hundreds of agricultural workers in Ecuador’s abaca plantations over decades. Many of the workers were Afro-descendants. At the end of the year, the Constitutional Court ruled that a foreign company had maintained “a practice of servitude akin to slavery” and ordered the company to pay individual reparations to the victims as well as ordering a public policy to combat servitude.
Sexual and reproductive rights
Despite legal advances in recent years, access to abortion remained severely restricted even in circumstances allowed by law. The lack of information about legal protections, social stigma and denial of lawful services for reasons of conscience, among other barriers, impeded pregnant people from exercising their reproductive rights.
Impunity
Human rights violations committed by security forces during protests in 2019 and 2022 remained unpunished.
