Forced disappearances and torture: Ecuadors war on drugs is brutal – and backed by US troops

The raid began at 4am. As the children slept, soldiers charged into the family home, rifles raised. “They said they were entering under the emergency powers,†says Rosa*, the family's matriarch, whose name has been changed for fear of retaliation. “They pointed their guns at us. I thought they were going to kill us all.â€

The soldiers quickly singled out her son, 16-year-old Jairo Damián Tapia Ãlvarez, and her nephew, 17-year-old Jostin Elian Ãlvarez Chávez, she says, separating the boys from the family.

“They said they were taking them in for an ongoing investigation and that, if we resisted, we would all be teargassed,†she says.

For days, the family searched frantically for the boys – at prosecutors' offices, police stations, hospitals, prisons, fields and even rubbish dumps.

Fifteen days later, Jostin reappeared. Bruised and scared, he said soldiers had tied up him and his cousin in a disused fire station, where they were beaten for information on people and criminal activities they knew nothing about. The soldiers threatened to kill the boys.

Then, a week after they were detained, the boys were driven to a cornfield. Jairo and another detainee were taken from the van; the soldiers carried guns and shovels. Moments later, Jostin heard two gunshots.

“We killed your cousin. Are you sad?â€, the soldiers asked him repeatedly in the days afterwards, Jostin said. Eventually, he managed to escape the soldiers and return home, but weeks later, disappeared again. Friends who were with him at the time said the military had taken him.

“We haven't heard anything since,†Rosa says. “We don't know where the boys are. All these missing children – where are they?â€

The Ãlvarez cousins, who went missing in September 2024, are among at least 51 people who are alleged to have been forcibly disappeared by security forces in Ecuador since President Daniel Noboa's declaration of an “internal armed conflict†in early 2024, which sharply expanded the military's role in domestic security.

The policy came in response to Ecuador's growing role as a critical transit hub for cocaine – an estimated 70% of the drug produced in Colombia and Peru now moves through the country's ports. In response to the escalating drug-trafficking crisis, western powers including the US, EU and Britain have expanded their support for Ecuador's security apparatus through intelligence cooperation, military aid and counter-narcotics assistance.

But as troops have flooded Ecuador's streets, reports of human rights abuses have increased.

“When the state of internal armed conflict began, everything changed,†Rosa says. “First the soldiers came, they were suddenly everywhere. Then they began attacking the people. It was never about protecting us; they only wanted to scare us.â€

Fernando Bastias Robayo, a lawyer representing the victims' families, says “nothing like this has ever happened in Ecuador beforeâ€. He adds: “There are dozens and dozens of forced disappearances, extrajudicial killings, torture – and none of it is being properly investigated.â€

Dave Robin Loor Roca, 20, was also detained by soldiers in a raid in 2024, while riding his motorbike in Ventanas, Los Ríos province, to buy food. Video reviewed by the Guardian shows him raising his hands and being forced into a military truck. His mother rushed to the scene and saw him inside the vehicle. Roca has not been seen since.

His family say prosecutors initially refused to register Roca's disappearance and acted only after legal pressure. An army report later confirmed he had been detained by a patrol, but claimed he was released the same evening – an account his relatives dispute.

“If he had been released, he would be with us,†says his aunt, who asked not to be named. “We don't know what happened; we don't know why they took him, where he is.â€

The commander in charge of the patrol refused to give evidence. When the prosecutor's office requested information from the armed forces, they replied that it was “classifiedâ€.

Camila Ruiz Segovia, a campaigner at Amnesty International, says that although the prosecutor's office is attempting to investigate allegations of abuse, the defence ministry refuses to cooperate. “The army says the information is confidential and part of the security policy of the president,†she says.

Ecuador's defence ministry did not respond to requests for comment.

Allegations of torture carried out under the state's emergency powers have also emerged, including in operations directly supported by western allies.

In March, workers at a remote dairy farm near the northern border said they were detained and tortured during a military operation – carried out with support from US forces – which the Ecuadorian army said had targeted organised crime. However, people in the area say the community, made up of 27 farming families, has no connection to criminal groups.

“The soldiers said they were the Ecuadorian military and that we had to come out with our hands on our heads,†says one worker, who asked not to be named. “They started questioning us, but we did not know anything about what they were asking. That's when the torture began.â€

He said his arms and legs were bound before he was beaten, kicked and repeatedly submerged in a water tank. “They hit us and said they would kill us all,†he says. Later, at a military base, the abuse continued.

“They electrocuted me. I passed out twice,†the worker says. “What they're doing is inhuman.â€

Four of the workers were loaded on to a helicopter, and allege that while in the air, the soldiers told the men they were going to throw them out.

Another detainee, Jason Daniels Vargas, says: “They kept telling me I would be the first one they would kill. So many things happened there, it is hard to think about.â€

María Espinosa, a lawyer with Ecuador's Alliance for Human Rights, said the soldiers also set two homes in the village alight.

The US was involved in the attack on the dairy farm, with Donald Trump writing in a letter to Congress that action had been taken “in partnership with the government of the Republic of Ecuadorâ€. While the president said US military personnel “did not come into contact with hostile forcesâ€, he acknowledged they were “present for this partnered operationâ€.

In a Senate hearing, the US military's southern command said that the US had moved to support Ecuadorian forces on a “very short timeline†after a phone call between Trump and Noboa. The US defense department did not respond to questions about its involvement in the operation.

After a New York Times investigation into the dairy farm operation, a group of US lawmakers on Wednesday called on the Pentagon to suspend joint military operations with Ecuadorian forces in the north immediately until the incidents had been fully investigated.

In a letter to the US defense secretary, Pete Hegseth, seen by the Guardian, the members of Congress said they were “deeply concerned†by reports of serious human rights violations and the bombing of “what appear to have been civilian facilities during joint US-Ecuador military operationsâ€.

They also demanded an explanation of the legal basis for the US military's involvement, saying Congress had not authorised it, and raised concerns about working with Noboa's administration, saying it had been “credibly accused of widespread human rights abusesâ€.

Despite mounting allegations of abuses, however, Ecuador's security strategy has been reinforced – not curtailed – by growing support from western allies.

The US has deepened military cooperation, launching joint operations and opening a FBI office in Ecuador. “There has been a qualitative change since September,†says Adam Isacson, of the Washington Office on Latin America, a human rights organisation. “It appears to go beyond intelligence sharing.â€

Britain and the EU have also increased their support for Ecuador's crackdown on organised crime, albeit less directly than the US. There is no evidence that they are supporting military operations on the ground. In May 2025, the British government signed a memorandum of understanding with Ecuador, “cementing†its cooperation against organised crime.

The EU has also expanded its presence, opening an intelligence and coordination centre in Guayaquil backed by a $2.3m (£1.7m) programme intended to strengthen the sharing of intelligence, investigations and the fight against transnational criminal networks.

Experts broadly agree that international cooperation is necessary, given Ecuador's prominent new role in global drug-trafficking networks. But they say that such help should be accompanied by very clear safeguards to ensure it does not support troops involved in rights abuses.

Martina Rapido Ragozzino, a researcher at Human Rights Watch, says: “The issue is when this cooperation does not come with clear requirements or benchmarks on how the government can use that support – and what it should not be doing.â€

Critics say those safeguards around western governments' support are lacking.

Anthony Smith, a French member of the Left group in the European parliament, says: “It's not in the name of fighting drug trafficking that you set aside the rule of law or fundamental rights.â€

Smith co-wrote a letter with other lawmakers raising concerns about the EU's support for Ecuador, given the recent allegations of human rights abuses, but said it had been met with little response. The EU also did not respond to requests for comment from the Guardian.

The Foreign Office said all British support overseas was subject to rigorous assessment to ensure compliance with human rights obligations and international law.

Despite the security crackdown, however, Noboa has not been able to curb the violence plaguing Ecuador. The Andean nation recorded its highest homicide rate in decades last year, with 50.9 murders for every 100,000 people, according to the interior ministry – a 31% rise on 2024.

Those working with family victims of forced disappearance say the impact of not knowing what happened is profound. “They are constantly asking: ‘Is he alive? Is he being tortured?',†says Suelin Noriega, a psychosocial support worker who is helping to care for the families.

“It's a permanent uncertainty,†she says. “It doesn't allow them to mourn.â€

As the families continue to wait for news of their children, there are growing demands for an end to Ecuador's militarisation.

“The soldiers have the power and believe that no one can stand up to them because they are the ultimate authority,†says Roca's aunt. “It needs to end now.â€