QUITO (Reuters) – Ecuador’s youngest mayor, Brigitte Garcia, and a councilor were found shot dead in a car early on Sunday morning, police said in the South American country, which is gripped by a wave of violence that the authorities attribute to drug trafficking
National police said they were investigating the deaths of Garcia, the 27-year-old mayor of San Vicente, and Jairo Loor, after their bodies were found in Manabi province. Both suffered gunshot wounds, police said in a statement.
Garcia belonged to former President Rafael Correa’s Citizens’ Revolution party.
Correa and Luisa Gonzalez, the party’s presidential candidate in recent elections, called Garcia’s killing a murder on the social media platform X.
“I just found out that they murdered our fellow San Vicente mayor Brigitte Garcia,” Gonzalez said in a post.
“I have no words, I am shocked, no one is safe in Ecuador, NO ONE.”
Garcia is the latest political figure in the country to be killed following the assassination of presidential candidate Fernando Villavicencio last August. Villavicencio, a vocal critic of corruption and organized crime, was killed while leaving a campaign event two weeks before the election.
President Daniel Noboa declared a state of emergency in January amid a spike in violence that saw gunmen invade a television station during a live broadcast. Noboa also designated 22 criminal groups as terrorist organizations.
The state of emergency was extended earlier this month.