QUITO, Ecuador (AP) — Ecuadorian police officers on Friday forcibly broke into the Mexican embassy in Quito, where former Ecuadorian Vice President Jorge Glas is holed up. The raid took place hours after the Mexican government granted Glas political asylum as diplomatic tensions between both countries deepen.
The police broke the external doors of the Mexican diplomatic headquarters in the Ecuadorian capital and entered the main patio.
The situation of former Vice President Glas was not immediately known. Uniformed officers closed the main access avenue to the site.
“This is not possible, it cannot be, this is crazy,” said Roberto Canseco, head of the Mexican consular section in Quito, outside the embassy.
Asked about the situation of former Vice President Glas and if he was apprehended by public forces, he stated: “I understand that yes, I am very worried because they could kill him; there is no basis to do this, this is totally outside the norm.”
Ecuador’s foreign ministry and Ecuador’s ministry of the interior did not immediately respond to a request for comment from The Associated Press.
The Mexican embassy in Quito remained under heavy police guard late Friday.
A day earlier, tensions between the two countries escalated after Mexico's President Andrés Manuel López Obrador made statements that Ecuador considered “very unfortunate” about the last elections in which the Ecuadorian president Daniel Noboa won.
In reaction, the Ecuadorian government declared the Mexican ambassador persona non grata.
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