In an interview with PRIMICIAS, the Ecuadorian Foreign Minister, Juan Carlos Holguín, reveals the regional concern about the establishment of criminal organizations in Haiti and the increase in migration from that country through Ecuador.
The ambassador of the United States, Linda Thomas-Greenfield, and the foreign minister of Ecuador, Juan Carlos Holguín, in Quito.
In recent months, the migration of people fleeing Haiti and who, on their way, pass through Ecuador, has grown.
Many of the immigrants are being trafficked by criminal groups and drug cartels, which have settled in Haiti, taking advantage of the institutional crisis in that country, says Foreign Minister Holguín.
Between 2021 and February 2023, 435 Haitian citizens arrived in Ecuador and 411 left the country.
Ecuador is also concerned about the border with Colombia, which continues to present the biggest security and defense challenges for the country.
How does the situation in Haiti affect Ecuador, where drug cartels and organized crime groups act freely due to the absence of authorities?
It is a crisis that has effects throughout the region. In recent months, the flow of Haitian migration to Ecuador has increased dramatically.
For some countries, the flow of Haitian immigrants has already become the main migratory pressure.
At this moment in Haiti there is no institutionality or elected authorities, so a series of criminal structures and irregular groups have begun to take the leadership of certain communities in that country.
What are the characteristics of Haitian migration in the case of Ecuador?
It is a transit migration, of people heading south, to countries like Chile, or heading north (ndr, to the United States via Central America).
According to the first information, the majority are people who are being trafficked by criminal structures, as mentioned by the United States ambassador to the UN, Linda Thomas-Greenfield, these criminal structures operate both in drug trafficking and in immigrant trafficking.
Are we talking about the drug cartels having installed themselves in Haiti, taking advantage of the institutional crisis in that country?
Drug cartels and criminal groups, which have ties to international organizations.
I cannot give more details because this problem will be discussed before the United Nations Security Council (ndr, of which Ecuador is a member).
What I can anticipate is that these are groups that mostly have connections with cartels that operate throughout the region.
Relations with Colombia and Argentina
Is the Total Peace policy of Colombian President Gustavo Petro a threat to Ecuador, who has precisely decided not to prosecute criminal organizations that operate on the border?
There is a working group that will have to report very soon to the presidents of Ecuador and Colombia on the progress made since the last binational cabinet, for the moment there has been coordinated work on the border.
It will be the Minister of Defense who will have to evaluate the results of these first coordinated works.
Do you see this as a threat to Ecuador? Because even though they have entered the Total Peace process, these groups, like Nueva Marquetalia, are still active in southern Colombia.
I cannot say that this policy is a threat, but I can confirm that for Ecuador border issues (ndr, with Colombia) are the most important challenge in terms of security and defense.
And how is the relationship with Argentina going after the impasse caused by the escape of former minister María de los Ángeles Duarte?
We hope that the facts can be clarified and, above all, resume a relationship that has traditionally and historically been one of friendship between the two countries.
You and Ambassador Thomas-Greenfield have spoken of imminent risks to democracy. What are those risks in the case of Ecuador and the region?
There are imminent risks for citizen security, for example, what is behind environmental crimes, generated by criminal structures, such as what we see in the case of illegal mining.
President Guillermo Lasso held a meeting in January with the president of Brazil, Luiz Inácio ‘Lula’ da Silva, and one of the topics discussed in the line of cooperation within the UN Security Council was that.
